The 2018 AACC/SYCL PhD Clinical Chemist Compensation Survey.

Area of Science:

• Laboratory medicine
• Clinical chemistry
• Healthcare professionals

Background:

• Doctoral-level board-certified clinical chemists are vital to laboratory medicine and healthcare.
• Compensation data for these professionals is limited.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the total compensation of clinical chemists.
• To identify factors influencing compensation, including location, employment sector, gender, and experience.

Main Methods:

• A confidential, self-reported compensation survey was conducted by the American Association for Clinical Chemistry's Society for Young Clinical Laboratorians (AACC SYCL) Core Committee in April 2018.
• Data from 133 US-based respondents with doctoral degrees and American Board of Clinical Chemistry certification were analyzed.
• Compensation trends were compared to previous AACC SYCL surveys from 2010 and 2013.

Main Results:

• Early career median salaries show an upward trend after adjusting for inflation.
• The survey identified a gender-based pay gap in certain geographic regions.
• Males with over 20 years of experience were highly represented (71%), potentially explaining some of the observed pay gap.

Conclusions:

• Clinical chemist salaries are increasing, particularly for early-career professionals.
• A gender pay gap exists, influenced by experience levels.
• Future research should explore compensation trends using non-self-reported data for enhanced accuracy.