Medical directorships serve an important role in the operation of healthcare organizations. Therefore, it’s likely that directorship pay will continue to be a part of many physicians’ compensation package. Lately, there has been an increase in scrutiny placed on directorship arrangements and ensuring their compliance with the Anti-Kickback Statute and Stark Law. This scrutiny has made it difficult for hospitals to compete for physician talent based on compensation alone.

Adding value to physician compensation

Hospitals are confined to fair market value rates for directorship services. As rates begin to plateau, how can hospitals make directorship pay more meaningful and stand out in the competition for top physicians?

To answer that question, first let’s take a look at how MaxWorth helps hospitals maximize the impact of their call pay arrangements with our Call Pay Solution®. Our program repurposes call pay into deferred compensation, allowing physicians to invest their call compensation on a pre-tax basis so that it ultimately amounts to a substantial source of retirement income.

Many of our clients have chosen to include directorship pay in their Physicians’ Advantage Plan, making it eligible for deferral alongside call compensation. By including directorship pay in this program, they’re able to stay within fair market value and still provide physicians with a unique and meaningful benefit.

Of course, the deferral of directorship pay does not have to be linked to the deferral of call pay. MaxWorth’s Physicians’ Advantage Plan™ can be set up to include any type of compensation provided by a hospital.

A competitive edge

Being able to provide this type of benefit gives hospitals a powerful tool not only for recruitment but also for retention. Given that physicians are considered “highly compensated,” federal regulations limit the amount of money they can contribute to qualified retirement plans such as 401(k) plans. As we mentioned in a previous blog post, this makes it mathematically impossible for them to adequately save for retirement. Anything hospitals can do to better position their doctors for retirement sends a message to physicians: their needs are being recognized and their compensation is designed to give them advantages they could not find anywhere else.