6 Figure Physical, Occupational and Speech Therapy Jobs

 Is is possible to earn 6 figures as a PT, OT or SLP? And even more, as a new grad? Is it possible to find remote jobs that could pay $100,000 or more to us therapists?

In this article, I'm going to prove to you that YES it is possible!

Oh course, it will take hard work, willingness to upgrade your skills, and creativity - but we'll dive into all of that in this blog. 

Physical, Occupational and Speech Therapy Jobs That Pay 6 Figures:

1. Travel Therapy: 

This is the most obvious six figure paying job. Just in case you aren't familiar with what is travel therapy, it's where you take short term contracts, usually 13 weeks at a time but can be more or less, in exchange for extremely high wages.

I was a traveler for several years and I would make double what a traditional PT would make, and if you were smart about how you saved, how you lived with, where you chose to take contracts then you could easily make six figures or even more as a traveler!

And for those of you wondering, I was just 1 year out so it's something new or newer grads can totally achieve. 

 *If you need amazing recruiters, we have several therapists and assistants turned recruiters that we would be happy to share their contact information with, just email us at [email protected]. 

2. Standard Therapy Jobs Plus Per Diem:

I don't think you should necessarily over complicate how to earn six figures as a new, recent, or established therapist. 

When I was a new grad PT, I earned six figures - and this was before I traveled. How? I found a well paying full time therapy job and then I supplemented that with one per diem role that I would do one or 2 weeks per month. Between the 2 jobs, I made roughly 6 figures! 

And this was before all the remote contracting roles out there. Now you could easily get a tele health contracting gig instead of having to go into a clinic on the weekend. 

3. Home Health Contracting With Companies Like Luna:

Luna is an amazing company that allows you to be your own boss of sorts, but without the hassle of finding clients, answering support questions, and dealing with hiring and firing. 

With Luna, you can work as much or as little as you want to but the average pay is around $70 per hour. This means that if you wanted to earn 6 figures a year,  If you worked 40 hours a week for a full year (52 weeks) then at $70 per hour you'll make $145,000! 

You can talk to our amazing PT turned Luna rep here and see if its the right fit for you: https://share.hsforms.com/1Tykc5DU9TRKLNc3iB6Snpg2rcdh?fbclid=IwAR200bqYmanRQQ-16BMKU_NRLVK5oQpGQUwsoQLjTVOHtUaieVxAhugq7Ps 

4. Creating your own business or adding a side hustle:

This is going to be a very vague section as you could leave a full time job and go your own way and make a business. Or you could work full time plus supplement your income with a side hustle.

You have so many talents and options! But this is definitely one strategy people have employed to 6 figures or more each year! 

There's so much to learn but we have a course that includes 2 private calls and walks you through everything you would ever need to know in creating a side hustle here: https://www.alternativehealthcarecareers.com/sidehustle 

5.. Tele health:

Tele health is a growing field and you can earn a six figure income one of two ways - you could get a full time tele health job or you could have a full time therapy job plus PRN in tele health or you go all in on just contracting work in tele health, and lastly you can create your own tele health business! 

Tele health pays very well, often similarly to clinical pay and if you do PRN or contracting work then you should expect between $60-100 plus per hour. 

6. Ergonomics:

Ergonomics has a lot of potential for you to earn 6 figures because it's a very diverse career field. You are likely not going to earn six figures as a full time employee in ergonomics - but as a contractor, you totally can!

In addition to taking ergonomics contracts, you can upsell ergonomic equipment either as a whole seller or as an affiliate, you can upsell maintenance packages, you can upsell courses, you can do public speaking events, you can get sponsored to talk about equipment or software, and you can get paid to help be a expert that helps grow ergonomics equipment, software, or businesses. 

For example, I'm still fairly new in the ergonomics world yet I've received several offers to review equipment, to receive free equipment, and to partner with ergonomic companies as an expert!

In addition, our coach Dr. Matt Jeffs is often getting paid thousands of dollars for his ergonomic assessments, getting paid to speak at major conferences world wide, and many more opportunities all the time! 

We have 3 amazing CEU and certifications that include our career guide and business training (include website template) here if you are inspired to see how much you can earn with ergonomics: https://www.alternativehealthcarecareers.com/ergonomics 

7.  Utilization Review:

Although the base salary of people in utilization management roles is around $80,000 to $85,000 plus benefits, there is a lot of potential for overtime which would easily bring you to six figures. 

In addition, utilization management is such a growing field that many of our students have performed lateral or upward mobility into new or different roles that pay even more - and yes $100,000! Once you are in the naviHealth/UnitedHealth Group family, there is a lot of internal referring and movement happening and so you could transition into being say a provider relations manager working more on the business and company interaction side and or you could become a team lead within a utilization review team. 

 By the way, we have an amazing program to help you get started in Utilization Review: https://www.alternativehealthcarecareers.com/courses/becomeautilizationreviewer 

8. Health Tech:

I've saved the most unique or interesting for last! There are lot of cool jobs and titles that you could do within the tech world that could make you six fgures. Maybe you won't be earning six figures right away, but I will say that compared to traditional therapy jobs where there is no upward mobility or raises - you'll often get raises, bonuses, and upward mobility in the health tech field. 

You could level up your skills and depending on your talents, passions, extra certifications, you can work in so many positions within health tech!

Here are just a few ideas:

1. Marketing

2. Social Media Manager

3. Product or Project Manager

4. Sales/ Customer Success/Customer Trainer

and if you have any tech background then you could work in UX/UI, web development, app development, coding, and many more varying titles. 

9. Recruiting:  

I used to be a travel physical therapist and travel therapy mentor and many of my recruiters were making more than my - even with my doctorate! Recruiting roles can be either remote or in person, depending on the company policy and how you negotiate this with the company. 

Your salary is a blend of a small salary plus commission. Because commissions make up a majority of your earnings - there is a large potential for you to make great money, especially if you are good at recruiting and are a hard worker! I do want to say that you should be prepared to work about at least a year before you'll $100,000 in earnings as you'll have to learn the systems and grow your client base. 

There are a TON of companies doing recruiting but some big ones you can search are MedTravelers, Cross Country, Marvel, Advanced, and MAS Staffing. Make sure too to look at not just  travel therapy recruiting but nursing recruiting, any other medical recruiting, and even outside of the health field like tech recruiting. 

I sincerely hope this has inspired you that making six figures is entirely possible and under a variety of different strategies and services! You got this!