Over the years, we’ve seen countless requests for side hustle ideas for physicians in specific specialties in our online physician communities. In this article, we continue our series of unique side gigs by specialty with side gigs for internal medicine doctors.
If you aren’t in IM and want to learn more about side gigs for your specific specialty, check out our page of side gig ideas for different specialties. If your specialty hasn’t been featured yet, follow the series on Instagram, where we’ve featured more specialties.
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Side Gigs for Internal Medicine Doctors
Moonlighting, locums, and urgent care
If your main motivation for your side gig is to make some extra cash, one of the most efficient ways to do this is simply to work more as a physician, as the hourly rate for locums pay for internal medicine physicians is pretty good compared to most other side gigs and physician salaries in general are higher than many professions. While you may not necessarily get to use a different part of your brain or learn a new skill set, this is a tried and true pathway to extra revenue for physicians. Another reason you may enjoy this side gig is the opportunity to work in a different environment or in a different role. Seeking clinical opportunities through moonlighting, locum tenens, and working with an urgent care center can all provide great ways to increase your patient facing hours and your earnings. One thing you’ll want to make sure is in place and that you ask about is what your malpractice insurance coverage policy is, especially when picking up shifts outside your regular employer, as you may need to purchase your own malpractice or tail insurance policy. Whenever possible, avoid situations where your tail insurance is not covered in these roles, as if you decide this gig is not for you or things in your life change, you don’t want to be left having to buy an expensive tail insurance policy just because you picked up a few random shifts the year before.
Related PSG Perk: Visit our medical malpractice insurance page for a discount on a malpractice insurance solution for your side gig.
These opportunities can vary in terms of flexibility, pay, and commitment/contract length. You may be able to pick up extra call or snag a few shifts moonlighting as a hospitalist or in urgent care when you want a little extra money. You may also be able to pick up event medicine physician gigs intermittently. Locums positions can be short term, but many last weeks or months, such as working as a cruise ship doctor.
Learn more about locums with:
Join our Physician Side Gigs group to sign-up for alerts on locums opportunities that match your criteria
Pharmaceutical speaking
Speaking is another popular side gig for physicians, and pharmaceutical speaking can be a great way to put your medical knowledge and experience to work outside of a clinical setting. There are several different opportunities within this realm, such as speaking at a conference, a symposium, or an industry event.
Speaking not only allows you to educate, but also attend events that can be a great way to network and collaborate with others in the healthcare industry and healthtech space. This side gig can also help establish you as a thought leader in your niche field of interest, which can open up additional side gig opportunities in the future such as start-up advisory roles and other highly lucrative consulting opportunities.
Pharmaceuticals is a highly regulated industry, so pay for these types of engagements are generally restricted, but many companies have guidelines in place to try to ensure speakers are compensated at a fair market value. An advantage to this regulation is that the company you’re working with will usually give you guidelines and talking points, as well as help handle arrangements for you.
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Consulting
Like pharmaceutical speaking, consulting for companies (pharmaceutical or otherwise) allows internal medicine physicians a larger potential reach and engagement versus their day-to-day clinical role. IM doctors enjoy this role because it allows them to be part of the process that ultimately helps improve treatment and care for their patients.
Your unique education and skill set can help pharmaceutical companies, medical device companies, AI companies, and others in the digital health or health innovation space focus their research efforts and money, and can help improve upcoming products you will potentially be using later down the development process in your clinical work. This can be a great way to let your voice and opinion be heard in the healthtech space, and in general, consulting opportunities tend to pay well. They can also be flexible around your clinical schedule, with many being virtual consultations that only require an hour or two of your time.
This side gig provides future growth potential into larger roles, such as nonclinical opportunities with pharmaceutical companies and becoming a physician on an advisory board, by providing experience in the industry and giving you opportunities to network within the space.
Learn more:
Paid medical surveys
Doing paid medical surveys is one of the most flexible options for a side gig for doctors. While they may not pay as well for internal medicine physicians as for other more specialized fields who typically work with more drugs and medical devices, this side gig can still offer additional income, especially for residents and fellows and new attendings still building up a practice.
There are ways to increase your chances of getting opportunities and thus increasing your income potential, such as signing up for multiple survey companies.
Learn more:
Clinical research
Clinical studies can be a great way to add an ancillary income stream to your private practice, while helping provide the latest cutting edge treatments for patients who need them and furthering the development of these therapies. The novel approaches available through clinical trials could result in potential life-changing outcomes for your patients who are in need of additional therapeutic options, which provides additional advantages along with the income this side gig provides, which can be substantial.
While much of this research is conducted at major academic institutions and by pharmaceutical companies, opportunities exist to establish a clinical trial site at your practice.
Learn more about clinical research opportunities for physicians.
Learn more about ways to increase revenue in your practice.
Chart review
Chart review is a popular side hustle for doctors and comes in many forms to consider, depending on your interests. Options include:
As a primary care physician, you’re likely no stranger to patterns in the referral process, as well as dealing with prior authorizations. This skill set is valuable knowledge for these types of chart review, if you don’t mind the administrative side of medicine.
Different chart review opportunities offer different compensation and vary in the amount of time commitment they require. Some can be done virtually from home, while others may have some in-person requirement, such as traveling for a deposition or testimony for expert witness work. It’s worth exploring different options to see which might be the best fit for your situation, and which one you may enjoy the most.
Learn more about chart review opportunities for physicians.
Physician advisor
Some people consider physician advisor roles a subset of chart review, as this is a big part of the role. Large healthcare organizations, as well as third-party companies, often seek physician advisors to help serve as a go-between between hospital systems and clinicians. Here, you can use your clinical knowledge to help improve care for patients and to work as an advocate for colleagues in inpatient medicine. Internal medicine physicians, especially those working in a hospitalist capacity, can be great for these roles as they generally have a good 30,000 foot view of not just the medical knowledge required to make decisions about appropriate management, but also related to resource utilization. By understanding the practicalities of the hospital system, they’re in a good position to navigate situations and help find solutions.
Learn more about the physician advisor role within a hospital system.
Social media influencer debunking myths
There is so much misinformation and noise about health on social media these days. As a primary care physician, you have a unique opportunity to help debunk the bad “science” presented as facts and help inform the masses.
We’ve seen a huge increase in interest in being a social media influencer, or in content creation through other means, such as a podcast or a YouTube channel. The influencer industry is continuing to grow, and doctors with our years of training and experience have so much potential knowledge to share. Internal medicine is a wide specialty, which can give you plenty of opportunities to develop a niche field of education you want to focus on. No matter what you pick, you’re more likely to be helpful than if someone simply Googles their medical concerns and goes down the rabbit hole.
Don’t feel confined to one medium. Many successful influencers weave a few together to help optimize multiple income streams, including a podcast or blog.
This side gig can take a while to monetize, but it can have amazing growth potential and the potential for passive income or scale. Don’t get us wrong - there’s nothing passive about it while you’re building though. You’ll need to put a lot of time into branding and building a following. The good news is that this brand can also help you get into other side gigs many doctors enjoy, such as speaking, coaching, and becoming a start-up advisor.
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Blogging or hosting a podcast on common medical issues
In addition to being a social media influencer, many physicians have found success in a similar influencer role blogging/vlogging and/or hosting a podcast. Many cross produce content on a podcast and via YouTube, allowing them to double their target audience into two different mediums while producing similar content.
Similar to building up a brand on social media, this side gig can take time to monetize, as much of the revenue comes from advertising, which requires an established following. But along the way, becoming an expert in your niche can lead to the other side gig opportunities mentioned above such as speaking and coaching.
Learn more about podcasting as a physician side gig.
Expert witness work
Expert witness work is a popular type of chart review doctors consider as a side gig. As an internal medicine physician, you’ve seen a lot of different cases and unfortunately have likely encountered situations where things have gone wrong. In these situations, physicians may unfortunately get drawn into litigation. For this litigation, attorneys often seek outside counsel from third-party physicians to review the case and provide an opinion on topics such as the standard of care and referral patterns.
While expert witness work can require travel to provide a deposition or testimony, it isn’t always. This can thus be a relatively flexible side gig and can be highly lucrative. While some physicians would love to be able to always work for the defense to help support fellow physicians, there may be instances where your expert opinion is needed for the prosecution, so keep that in mind as you explore this side hustle.
Dive deeper into expert witness work with:
Join our Physician Side Gigs community to sign-up for alerts of expert witness opportunities that match your desired criteria
Patient care navigator or advocate
No one knows how to navigate the healthcare system better than doctors in primary care and internal medicine fields. This can offer a unique opportunity for a side gig, as well as a chance to make a significant impact in wellness and care for individuals who need additional guidance with their medical issues.
Patients facing difficult health issues are often more than willing to pay someone to help them navigate their care. This can include responsibilities such as:
Going through results in more detail
Attending doctor’s appointments with them
Working with their specialists to navigate and help coordinate care
Visiting them during hospital admissions
While this can be a rewarding side gig both personally and monetarily, it can open you up to additional potential risks and issues. It’s important to have appropriate malpractice insurance in place, and stay within the standard of care. It can also be helpful to set boundaries and establish patient expectations at the beginning, such as the timing of your availability and what role you will fill during their treatment and care.
Physician startup advisor
We’ve mentioned above how many other side gigs for internal medicine doctors can help build up a specific niche of expertise and establish you as a thought leader, which can lead to future opportunities such as advisory roles.
Companies in the healthtech industry, especially startups, often seek out the unique knowledge physicians possess of the needs of the healthcare landscape to help guide their direction and the future development of their products and services. These advisory board positions can offer huge payouts, especially if you get in near the beginning with a company whose mission you believe in and who is well situated to expand into a key player in the industry.
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Startup investor or founder
Some physicians want to move beyond the advisory roles and actually invest in startups, either via angel investing or venture capital. While this is anything but a surefire pathway to revenue, it can pay off in a big way if it goes big.
Many physicians in our communities engage in consulting or advisory roles and then realize that they want to be at the helm of actually creating something themselves. Some of these physicians go on to start their own companies. While this can start out as a side gig, if they gain traction, most startup founders will eventually have to make this a full time gig if they’re really going to scale.
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Publishing a book
We’ve seen several internal medicine physicians in our communities publish popular books recently on topics of interest to the general public, like gut health, menopause, longevity, and more. Patients love hearing from experts in fields, and you may find yourself wanting to take some of the lessons you teach your patients on a daily basis and collate them into a published work. We’ve also seen our physicians often publish books about the healthcare industry and public health. And of course, many of our physicians publish books that have nothing to do with medicine at all!
Learn more about publishing a book.
Additional resources for internal medicine physicians
While we’ve outlined above some common side gig ideas for internal medicine doctors, there’s always room for creativity. With the versatile training and skill sets internal medicine doctors have, there are a vast majority of potential side gigs to consider. If there’s something you’re passionate about and good at, look for ways to monetize it!
Dive deeper into some of the side gigs featured above, including:
Explore the following to learn more about:
Side gig articles on our blog
Self-employed finances and taxes primers to help manage your side gig income
Physician Facebook groups, which are free to join and aim to ensure a safe space for physicians to talk side gigs, finances, life in medicine, and everything in between