According to a recent survey, prepared by Merritt Hawkins, an AMN Healthcare Company, the trends of hiring 
radiologists for work has shifted from private, smaller radiology groups to larger hospitals and big teleradiology facilities. Merritt Hawkins mentioned that it has checked incentives of nearly 2800 physicians, in the period from April 1, 2009, to March 31, 2010. It was found that the sample for radiology was not big but it indicated a new trend, which was that private radiology groups were rarely asking for radiologists, unlike other telardiology providers and larger hospitals.
Sam Karam, division vice president of Merritt Hawkins, said “As a matter of fact, it’s more often than not the private groups that are saying, ‘We can’t afford to recruit. We need to cut back an FTE or two,’” he continued “Where we’re getting the requests is either from hospitals or these teleradiology companies, and even sometimes a multispecialty group.” The survey also showed that the salaries offered to radiologists are relatively high with an increase in the general demand for radiologists to image cancer patients. Merrit Hawkins carries out the survey every year. The data showed that in the period from 2009 to 2010, the number of searches for radiologists was reduced from 74 to 63. The number was continuing to decline as the previous two years had 109 and 187 searches respectively. Karam commented saying that the difference between supply and demand for radiologists was decreasing. Karam said “I don’t see that changing; 2010 isn’t going to surprise us,” he added “I’m going to assume the demand for searches for radiology is going to stay consistent with what we saw in 2009.” Karam noted that there was an increasing search for specialized radiologists. He said “Most of our clients are not looking for general radiologists, they’re looking for subspecialists like neuro-interventional radiologists,” he added “The demand is there but it’s changed, it’s become more sub-specialized, so the number of radiologists people require is fewer.”
