Baylor Scott & White Health said it's giving a $500 bonus to employees in gratitude for their work the last 14 months during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Several healthcare companies, including King of Prussia, Pa.-based Universal Health Services, Walgreens and Labcorp, were called out in a new report that highlights the 100 S&P 500 companies with the lowest median worker wages in 2020.

Baptist Health System in San Antonio is offering new nurses, as well as patient care and lab associates, up to $20,000 sign-on bonuses, the health system said in an announcement about its upcoming hiring event May 11.

Service Employees International Union, which represents more than 1 million healthcare workers, is taking aim at Nashville, Tenn.-based HCA Healthcare for what it calls runaway executive competition in an advertising blitz.

Philadelphia-based Jefferson Health has dropped a policy that linked some physician bonuses to patient referrals to its fundraising office, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.  

Johns Hopkins University and Johns Hopkins Health System, both based in Baltimore, are boosting their minimum wage to $15 per hour, they said May 6.

Employees at Big South Fork Medical Center in Oneida, Tenn., say the hospital is still behind on paying them and relying more on staffing agency workers amid frustrations over the payroll issue, according to The Independent Herald.

Physicians practicing orthopedics have the highest average incentive bonus among specialties, according to Medscape's "Physician Compensation Report 2021."

Male physicians continue to earn more money than female physicians in 2021 — 27 percent more in primary care and 33 percent more in specialty care, to be precise. 

The CEOs of Centene, HCA Healthcare and AbbVie are among the highest-paid chief executives of the largest U.S. companies, according to Equilar.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, primary care physicians earned an average annual compensation of $242,000 and specialists earned an average of $344,000 — a decrease of $1,000 and $2,000, respectively, compared to before the public health crisis hit. 

The compensation committee of HCA Healthcare's board of directors adopted a senior officer performance bonus program for 2021 on April 9, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. 

The CEOs of some of the biggest hospital and health insurance companies saw their pay soar last year, despite challenges linked to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Insider. 

Some top executives at major for-profit hospital operators saw their total compensation rise last year, while others saw total pay decline. 

The average annual wage across all healthcare support occupations in the U.S. was $32,250 in May 2020, according to the latest data released March 31 by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. 

The average annual salary for nurse practitioners in the U.S. is $114,510, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' occupational employment statistics survey, released March 31.

The average annual salary for physician assistants in the U.S. is $116,080, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' occupational employment statistics survey, released March 31.

The average annual salary for registered nurses in the U.S. is $80,010, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' occupational employment statistics survey released March 31.

An additional 36 years have been added to the estimated time it will take to close the gender pay gap, bringing the total to 135 years, according to a March 30 report published by the World Economic Forum.

Sentara Healthcare has boosted its hourly minimum wage to $15 and is providing across-the-board 3 percent merit pay increases to employees, the organization said.