Hematopathology — Specialty Profile

Exploratory, not prescriptive. This profile blends hard data (pay, match rates, burnout, demographics, each sourced and dated) with generalizations and synthesized opinion about culture and "who fits." It's here to help you get curious and go find out for yourself, not to tell you who to become. Numbers marked ⟳ verify change every year; check the linked source before you quote one. Last reviewed: 2026-08-04.

Also called: hemepath, hematologic pathology. A 1-year ACGME-accredited fellowship entered after a pathology residency, or from hematology on the internal medicine side. Organ systems: blood, bone marrow, lymph nodes, spleen, and the immune system.

Subspecialty fellowship of Pathology.

The 30-second version

Hematopathology is the diagnosis of blood, bone marrow, and lymphoid cancers, and it is the pathology subspecialty where a single report most directly writes a treatment plan. A lymphoma diagnosis is not a name; it is a name plus an immunophenotype plus a set of molecular and cytogenetic findings, and the combination determines whether the patient receives chemoimmunotherapy, a targeted agent, CAR-T cells, or observation. The hematopathologist assembles that combination from four kinds of data at once: the morphology on the slide, the flow cytometry, the immunohistochemistry, and the molecular and cytogenetic results. Very few diagnostic roles in medicine integrate that many independent data streams into one answer, and almost none does it on a disease taxonomy that changes as fast, since the field currently operates under two competing 2022 classification systems that do not entirely agree with each other. The trade at the center of the field: among the best-paid and most intellectually demanding corners of pathology, in a one-year fellowship with a real job market, done entirely without patients.

Quick dashboard (details and sources below)
Training after med school 5 years (4 yr AP/CP pathology + 1 yr hematopathology fellowship)
Total from college start ~13 years (4 undergrad + 4 med school + 4 residency + 1 fellowship)
Training chain Med school (4) → Pathology (4) → 1 yr ACGME hematopathology fellowship → ABPath hematopathology certificate
Competitiveness Sought-after inside pathology and reachable. Its first NRMP match filled 108 of 127 positions, 85.0% ⟳
Typical full-time pay No survey isolates it. Parent pathology runs $394,000 (Medscape 2026) to $373,384 (Doximity 2025); the one subspecialty study, academic-only and from 2016, puts hematopathology's median at $239,857 ⟳
Pay vs. parent (general pathology) Mid-pack among pathology's subspecialties in the only data that measures them, below dermatopathology and GI pathology. The "highest-paid subspecialty" claim came from an aggregator and is gone ⟳
Lifestyle Microscope and screen based, daytime, weekday, minimal call ⟳
Burnout No subspecialty figure; parent pathology is 28.3% against a 41.9% all-physician average (AMA 2025), third-lowest of the rows it names ⟳
% women Hematopathology fellows 44.0% (ACGME, AY2024-25); parent pathology 44% practicing, residents 54.7% ⟳
DO / IMG accessibility Very open — of the 108 fellows who matched for 2026, 17 were US DO and 56 were international graduates ⟳

What they actually do

Hematopathologists diagnose neoplastic and non-neoplastic disease of blood, bone marrow, and lymphoid tissue.

Lymphoma diagnosis is the intellectual centerpiece. Lymph node and extranodal biopsies arrive with a differential that spans dozens of entities, and separating them requires morphology plus immunophenotype plus, increasingly, molecular findings. The classification itself is unsettled in an unusual way: two competing systems published in 2022, the WHO fifth edition and the International Consensus Classification, both remain in use and do not agree on every entity, so a practicing hematopathologist has to know which framework a given clinician, trial, or journal is working in.

Bone marrow interpretation is the volume. Aspirates and core biopsies for acute leukemia, myelodysplastic syndromes, myeloproliferative neoplasms, plasma cell disorders, and staging of lymphoma, plus the non-neoplastic work of cytopenias and marrow failure. This is bread-and-butter hematopathology and it arrives continuously.

Flow cytometry is a discipline in itself. The hematopathologist designs, interprets, and signs out flow panels, which is a genuinely different analytic skill from reading a slide and is one of the main things the fellowship teaches. Minimal residual disease assessment by flow has become a treatment-defining measurement in leukemia.

Coagulation and the clinical laboratory side round it out at many institutions, since hematopathology sits across anatomic and clinical pathology in a way most subspecialties do not.

Representative work: peripheral blood smear and bone marrow aspirate and biopsy interpretation · lymph node and extranodal lymphoma diagnosis · flow cytometry panel design and interpretation · immunohistochemistry selection · integration of cytogenetics, FISH, and next-generation sequencing results · minimal residual disease assessment · consultation on outside cases · tumor board participation with hematology and oncology · coagulation and hemostasis laboratory oversight at some institutions.12

A day in the life: a screen and a microscope, and more conversation than outsiders expect. Cases are previewed, flow data is reviewed alongside the slides, ancillary studies are ordered and then integrated, and cases are signed out. The hematopathologist is in frequent contact with hematologists and oncologists, because the diagnosis often needs clinical context and the treatment decision often needs the pathologist's nuance. Tumor board attendance is routine and the hematopathologist frequently presents.

The turnaround pressure is real. Acute leukemia is a diagnosis that changes management within hours, and a marrow on a patient with pancytopenia in an intensive care unit is not a case that waits.

On call: light. Some institutions run an on-call system for urgent leukemia diagnoses and stat flow, but there is no overnight service in the way clinical specialties have one.

The training path & time to completion

Medical school (4 yrs) → anatomic and clinical pathology residency (4 yrs) → 1-year ACGME-accredited hematopathology fellowship → ABPath subspecialty certification in hematopathology.12

  • The fellowship is one year and ACGME-accredited. Some trainees add a second year, often in molecular genetic pathology, which is a common and well-regarded pairing given how much molecular data the field now integrates.
  • ABPath issues the certificate, one of its eleven subspecialty certifications, available after one or two years of ACGME-accredited fellowship training to candidates holding ABPath primary certification.2
  • Total from the start of college: about 13 years.

Hematopathology is at the front of the recruitment reform, and that matters practically. Pathology fellowships have historically had no unified match, with recruitment drifting so early in residency that trainees committed before rotating through the subspecialties. The College of American Pathologists signed a joint statement, proposed by the Association for Academic Pathology's Fellowship Directors Committee, calling for fairer and more transparent recruitment. Hematopathology is one of four subspecialties that committed to a match for the 2026–27 academic year, alongside molecular genetic pathology, forensic pathology, and bone and soft tissue pathology. Others are being encouraged to join the 2027 cycle, placing fellows for 2028–29.3 85% of residents say they prefer a later, unified timeline.4 ⟳ That first match has now run, and the NRMP published its results in February 2026.5

If you are a pathology resident reading this, the practical implication is that hematopathology recruitment is now more structured and later than most of its sibling subspecialties, which is an advantage rather than a hurdle.

How competitive is it?

The first match has run, and the NRMP published the results in February 2026. For the 2026 appointment year, 70 programs offered 127 positions and 108 filled, a rate of 85.0%. That left 19 positions empty across 14 programs. Of the 116 applicants who ranked the specialty, 108 matched, and 61 of those went to the program they had listed first.5 ⟳

What the first published cycle says:

  • It is reachable. NRMP reports 7 applicants unmatched, 6.0% of the field, against 19 positions nobody took. Its own row does not quite reconcile, since 116 applicants ranked the specialty and 108 matched, so the published 6.0% is the figure to read rather than the raw count. Either way this is a fellowship with room in it.5 ⟳
  • Hematopathology is consistently among the most sought-after pathology fellowships, along with dermatopathology, and the reasons are a strong job market, well-regarded compensation, and intellectual depth. The match result does not undercut that. A sought-after fellowship in a small specialty can still have more seats than applicants.
  • The openness of the parent field carries into the fellowship. Pathology runs 19.6% DO and 34.7% IMG of its entering class, among the most open specialties in medicine. Both shares are measured against positions filled in the 2026 Match, 634 of the 636 offered, and that is the denominator every pathology figure on this page uses.6 Of the 108 who matched here, 34 were US MD graduates, 17 were US DO graduates, 16 were US citizens who trained abroad, 40 were non-US international graduates, and 1 was Canadian. The NRMP names hematopathology among the five subspecialties with the highest share of non-US international graduates, at 37.0%.5 ⟳
  • The move to a match made competitiveness legible for the first time, and the figures above are what that looks like. Under the old system, an applicant's outcome depended substantially on how early they committed and who they knew, which is precisely what the reform names as the problem.34

The honest read. Reachable, and now measurably so. This is one of the destinations that makes pathology's accessibility worth having, and the first published cycle says a resident who wants it and has rotated and done research in it can expect a spot somewhere.

Board: ABPath subspecialty certification in hematopathology.2

Compensation — the robust version

No national compensation survey isolates hematopathology. Medscape and Doximity both stop at "pathology," and the College of American Pathologists' own practice survey splits by academic against non-academic rather than by subspecialty. What exists instead is one academic benchmarking study and one society job-market survey, and between them they say something different from what this page used to.

The parent anchor. Medscape's 2026 report puts the pathologist average at $394,000 (2025 earnings), and Doximity's 2025 report at $373,384 (2024 earnings). The College of American Pathologists' most recent public Practice Characteristics Survey, from 2017, gives a mean total cash compensation of $322,791 against a median of $280,000, split academic against non-academic and not by subspecialty.7 ⟳

The one study that measures pathology subspecialties, and it does not say what this page used to say. The Association of Pathology Chairs surveyed 43 US academic pathology departments for 2016 earnings and reported compensation for single-subspecialty practitioners. Hematopathology, n=39, came in at a 25th percentile of $221,177, a median of $239,857, a 75th percentile of $290,000, and a mean of $264,197.8 ⟳

Set against the same table's other rows, hematopathology sits in the middle rather than at the top:

Subspecialty Median n
Dermatopathology $347,309 15
Gastrointestinal pathology $271,179 13
Renal pathology $270,000 19
Surgical pathology $245,655 54
Hematopathology $239,857 39
Cytopathology $239,878 15
Neuropathology $220,139 15

Two caveats travel with that table and neither is small. It is academic practice only, so it excludes the large private groups and national reference laboratories where hematopathology's money actually concentrates. And the earnings year is 2016, a decade old, with no newer edition published. It is the best subspecialty data anyone has produced, and it is not current.

What the field's own job-market survey says about starting pay. The American Society for Clinical Pathology's 2022 Fellowship and Job Market Survey queried 304 pathology fellows across five subspecialties, 128 of them in hematopathology, and across all of them the modal proposed starting salary was $200,001 to $250,000. The 2017 edition, whose hematopathology group numbered 134, gives its most frequent range the same way, across subspecialties: $150,000 to $200,000. ASCP publishes the by-subspecialty detail as a bar chart without printed values, so those all-fellow bands are the numeric text the survey actually gives.8 ⟳

The mechanism is volume plus billable complexity. Bone marrow interpretation, flow cytometry, and the ancillary studies that go with them generate substantial professional and technical billing, and the specimen flow is continuous. Unlike neuropathology, which has no high-volume private version, hematopathology exists in commercial reference laboratories, large private pathology groups, and academic centers alike, so there is a genuine market with genuine competition for people.

Where the ceiling is. Partnership in a large private pathology group and senior positions at national reference laboratories are the high end. Academic hematopathology pays academic rates and is where the hardest consultation work and the classification debates live.

What this page removed and why: it used to carry a band of $226,000–$417,000 for hematopathology, called it "among the highest-compensated pathology subspecialties," and sourced it to a compilation of Salary.com, Glassdoor and BLS data. Three problems. Salary.com and Glassdoor are aggregators with no methodology. The band's midpoint of about $322,000 sat below the parent field's own surveyed figure while the sentence around it claimed a premium. And the ranking it asserted is contradicted by the only real subspecialty data, which puts hematopathology below dermatopathology by more than $100,000. The band is gone and nothing replaced it, because nothing current exists to replace it with. ⟳

The honest summary: plan against the parent field. Pathology as a whole is measured every year by two national surveys; hematopathology is not measured at all outside academic medicine, and the academic figure is from 2016. If you are negotiating, the useful numbers on this page are the pathology averages and the ASCP starting-salary bands, and the useful move is to ask people in the field directly. ⟳

Lifestyle

  • Daytime, weekday, and controllable, inheriting pathology's defining advantage of little traditional call.6
  • Turnaround pressure rather than schedule pressure. An acute leukemia marrow needs an answer today, which shapes the intensity of the day rather than its length.
  • Screen and microscope work, with flow cytometry interpretation done at a workstation, which makes parts of the practice digitally portable.
  • Frequent clinical contact for a pathology subspecialty. Tumor boards and direct conversation with hematologists are routine, so this is a less isolated corner of pathology than most.
  • Geographic flexibility is good. Hematopathologists work in academic centers, large private groups, and national reference laboratories, and those exist in many markets. This is a substantially wider map than neuropathology or pediatric pathology.

Lifestyle rating: 5/5. Weekday, callless, portable, and part-time-viable, with the intensity showing up as turnaround expectations rather than hours.

Wellbeing — the part to take seriously

No hematopathology-specific wellbeing data exists.

Burnout inherits pathology at 28.3% against a 41.9% all-physician average, third-lowest of the rows the AMA's 2025 Organizational Biopsy names.6 ⟳

The distinctive stress is diagnostic consequence under time pressure. A lymphoma subtype determines a treatment regimen, and getting it wrong sends a patient down the wrong protocol. The classification's genuine ambiguity in borderline cases, compounded by two competing 2022 systems in simultaneous use, means the field lives with real uncertainty at its edges and manages it through second opinions and expert consultation practice.

The volume of malignancy stands out. Nearly everything a hematopathologist diagnoses is cancer or a precursor to it, and while the patient is not in the room, the case is a person whose oncologist is waiting. Practitioners generally describe this as motivating rather than heavy, and the field's satisfaction comes largely from the sense that the report is doing real work.

The classification churn is either the appeal or the problem, depending on temperament. Entities are added, merged, and renamed on a continuing basis, and staying current is permanent work. People who like that describe it as the field staying alive; people who do not find it exhausting.

The isolation question is milder here than in most of pathology, because tumor board and clinician contact are built into the practice.

Who's in the field (demographics)

The first NRMP match gives DO and international-graduate figures for the fellowship itself, and ACGME counts its fellows by sex. The rest is inherited from pathology, directionally.

  • Women: the NRMP does not report gender, but ACGME does, and it puts hematopathology fellows at 44.0% women in academic year 2024-25.6 ⟳ That sits about ten points below parent pathology's residents, who are 54.7% women, and level with the 44% of practicing pathologists.6 ⟳
  • DO: 17 of the 108 fellows who matched for 2026 were US DO graduates, 15.7% of the matches.5 ⟳ That tracks the parent field, which is among the most DO-accessible specialties at 19.6% of the entering class, and no additional fellowship filter is documented.6 ⟳
  • IMG: 56 of the 108, just over half, were international graduates, 16 of them US citizens who trained abroad and 40 non-US graduates.5 ⟳ Parent pathology runs 34.7% IMG, among the highest of any specialty, and this fellowship runs higher still, which makes hematopathology one of the more internationally accessible routes to a well-paid subspecialty career.6 ⟳
  • Underrepresented in medicine: no subspecialty figure; pathology's overall profile is inherited. ⟳

Culture, personality & the online stereotypes

Who gravitates here: pathology residents who liked the integrative puzzle. Hematopathology attracts people who enjoy assembling an answer from several independent data types and who are comfortable with a taxonomy that keeps moving. It also draws people who want clinician contact without patients, since tumor board and phone consultation are constant. As always, plenty of people in the field do not fit any single mold.

The stereotypes. Community perception rather than fact, each with a kernel and an unfair edge:

  • "The pathologists who actually talk to people." Reasonably accurate, and meant kindly. Hematopathology has more clinical interface than most diagnostic subspecialties.
  • "A field where the names change every five years." True enough to sting, given two competing 2022 classifications in simultaneous use, and it reflects genuine scientific progress rather than committee churn.
  • "Flow is the whole job." An overstatement of something real. Flow cytometry is a large and distinctive part of the training, and morphology remains the foundation the flow data is interpreted against.
  • "The fellowship everyone wants." Broadly true within pathology, and the reason is the combination of job market, pay, and intellectual content rather than any one of them.

What people say online (synthesized and paraphrased, not quotes): across trainee and physician forums, hematopathology reads as one of the two safest bets in pathology, alongside dermatopathology. The recurring themes are employability, with posters noting that hemepath-trained pathologists are in demand at both academic centers and reference laboratories, and intellectual satisfaction, with the integrative diagnosis described as the most interesting work in the specialty. A second thread concerns the molecular genetic pathology add-on year, generally regarded as a strong pairing that increases marketability. A third is the classification dispute, discussed with a mixture of exasperation and interest. A fourth, newer and warmly received, is the arrival of a real match, with residents welcoming a structured, later timeline. The tone is confident and practical.

Voices from the field. Paraphrased from published sources, with links to the originals:

  • ABPath lists hematopathology among its eleven subspecialty certifications, available after one or two years of ACGME-accredited fellowship training.2
  • Hematopathology is one of four subspecialties that committed to a formal match for the 2026–27 academic year, alongside molecular genetic pathology, forensic pathology, and bone and soft tissue pathology, as part of a CAP-backed reform of pathology fellowship recruitment.3
  • The internet is confident that hematopathology is one of pathology's best-paid subspecialties, and the only survey that has ever measured them side by side puts it fifth of seven, below dermatopathology by more than $100,000. That survey is academic-only and from 2016, so it does not settle the question either. What it does settle is that the confident claim had nothing behind it.8 ⟳

Why people choose it / why people leave

Why choose it: integrative diagnosis that combines morphology, flow, immunohistochemistry, and molecular data into one answer · a report that directly determines a treatment regimen · among pathology's best-paid subspecialties, with a real market in academic, private, and reference-laboratory settings · a one-year fellowship, so the opportunity cost is small · more clinician contact and less isolation than most of pathology · genuine geographic flexibility · a scientifically fast-moving field.

Why leave or avoid it: no patients, which some people miss · turnaround pressure on cases that cannot wait · a classification that changes continuously, currently with two competing systems in simultaneous use · diagnostic stakes at the borderline, where subtype determines regimen · high case volume in the bread-and-butter marrow work.

Best fit if: you like assembling answers from multiple data streams · you want a diagnostic career with real clinical relevance and real clinician contact · you want a strong job market and geographic choice · you are comfortable with a moving taxonomy · you want a short fellowship with a clear payoff.

Not for you if: you need patients · continuous reclassification would frustrate you · you want procedural work · you would rather sign out simple cases quickly than build complex integrated diagnoses.

The FLI angle — Hematopathology for first-gen, low-income & immigrant students

Where it fits FLI realities well:

  • This may be the best risk-adjusted destination in pathology for an FLI student, and the reason is the combination. The entrance is one of the most open in medicine at 19.6% DO and 34.7% IMG.6 The fellowship is one year. The compensation sits at the upper end of the specialty. The job market spans academic centers, private groups, and reference laboratories, so geography is genuinely negotiable.7 Very few paths in medicine combine an open door with a strong destination this cleanly.
  • The one-year fellowship keeps the opportunity cost low, which matters if people depend on your income. Thirteen years from the start of college is on the shorter side for a subspecialist.
  • The lifestyle is sustainable, with weekday hours and no overnight service.
  • The new match should help you specifically. The old, early, unstructured recruitment favored applicants with mentorship and inside information, which is precisely what FLI applicants tend to lack. A later unified timeline is a fairness improvement that lands in your favor.34

Risks to name honestly:

  • Pathology as a whole pays below most of medicine, at $373,384 to $394,000 for the parent field depending on the survey.7 Where hematopathology sits inside pathology is genuinely unknown outside academic practice. If maximizing income is the goal, this is not the highest ceiling available; it is a very good return for an open door and a short fellowship.
  • PSLF fits the well-paid version of this career poorly. Academic hematopathology qualifies; private groups and commercial reference laboratories generally do not. As elsewhere on this site, the higher-paying path and the forgiveness path diverge, and that is a decision to make deliberately.
  • The compensation data is poor, so you will negotiate without a reliable benchmark. The most recent numbers anyone publishes for your subspecialty are academic-only and ten years old. Ask people in the field directly rather than trusting aggregator figures that vary by nearly $200,000 for the same job.
  • No patient contact is a real thing to test rather than reason about. Some people find it liberating and some find it hollow, and the only way to know is a rotation.

Bottom line for FLI: an open front door, a one-year fellowship, upper-tier pay within the specialty, and a job market with real geographic choice. For a student who needs a reliable route to a stable, well-paid, sustainable career without a research arms race at the gate, hematopathology is one of the strongest answers in medicine. Test the no-patients question early, and choose academic versus private with your eyes open about PSLF.

Fun facts

  • The field currently runs on two competing classifications. The WHO fifth edition and the International Consensus Classification, both published in 2022, remain in simultaneous use and do not agree on every entity.
  • One diagnosis, four data types. A modern lymphoma or leukemia diagnosis integrates morphology, immunophenotype, cytogenetics, and molecular findings into a single line.
  • Flow cytometry is its own analytic craft, and learning to design and read panels is one of the main things the fellowship year teaches.
  • It is one of the first four pathology subspecialties to adopt a formal match, for the 2026–27 academic year, after decades without one. The first run filled 108 of 127 positions.35
  • The lymphoma classification maps onto normal B-cell development, so the taxonomy that looks arbitrary from outside is really a map of where maturation arrested.
  • Minimal residual disease measured by flow now guides treatment in leukemia, which means the pathologist's number, not just the pathologist's name for the disease, changes what happens next.

Sources

Footnotes

  1. Fellowship structure and clinical scope. Duke University Department of Pathology — Fellowship Programs, listing hematopathology as an ACGME-accredited fellowship open to board-eligible and board-certified pathologists, alongside 1-year ACGME cytopathology and dermatopathology and 2-year ACGME neuropathology. https://pathology.duke.edu/education/fellowships (accessed 2026). ↩ ↩2

  2. Board structure. American Board of Pathology — Subspecialty Certification: ABPath issues subspecialty certificates in blood banking/transfusion medicine, chemical pathology, clinical informatics, cytopathology, dermatopathology, forensic pathology, hematopathology, medical microbiology, molecular genetic pathology, neuropathology, and pediatric pathology; candidates with ABPath primary certification may qualify after one or two years of ACGME-accredited fellowship training. Subspecialty exams scheduled September 8–28, 2026. https://abpath.org/subspecialty-certification/ (accessed 2026). ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  3. Fellowship match reform. College of American Pathologists — "CAP Supports Fellowship Match Effort, Reinforces Workforce Commitment": CAP signed a joint statement proposed by the Association for Academic Pathology Fellowship Directors Committee; hematopathology, molecular genetic pathology, forensic pathology, and bone and soft tissue pathology committed to a match for the 2026–27 academic year, with other eligible subspecialties encouraged to join the 2027 cycle placing fellows for 2028–29. https://newsroom.cap.org/latest-news/cap-supports-fellowship-match-effort--reinforces-workforce-commitment/s/97304fd5-c16c-459d-a2ce-acb517b0bd06 ⟳ ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5

  4. The recruitment-timing problem. The Pathologist, "Fixing Fellowship Fatigue" (October 2025) — the pathology fellowship application and selection process has shifted earlier in residency, often requiring residents to commit before experiencing many subspecialty areas, with residents accepting offers under pressure before completing interviews; 85% of residents prefer a later, unified timeline. https://thepathologist.com/issues/2025/articles/october/fixing-fellowship-fatigue/ ⟳ ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  5. Match results. NRMP, Results and Data: Specialties Matching Service 2026 Appointment Year, February 2026, reporting hematopathology's first cycle in the Specialties Matching Service. Table 1A: 70 programs, 127 positions offered, 108 filled, 85.0% filled overall (26.8% by US MD graduates), 116 applicants, 14 programs unfilled. Table 2, matched fellows by applicant type: 34 US MD, 17 US DO, 16 US IMG, 40 non-US IMG, 1 Canadian; the report names hematopathology among the five subspecialties with the highest non-US IMG share, at 37.0%. Table 5: 116 applicants ranked the specialty (114 preferred it), 108 matched, 61 of them to their first-choice program, 0 matched in another specialty, 7 unmatched (6.0%). https://www.nrmp.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/SMS_Results_and_Data_Report2026.pdf ⟳ Corrected 2026-08-17: the competitiveness section printed "116 applicants … 108 matched" and "seven applicants … went unmatched" four lines apart, as though the row summed. It does not: 116 minus 108 is 8, and the neighboring rows in Table 5 (forensic pathology 51/49/2, molecular genetic pathology 45/41/4, bone and soft tissue 13/10/3) all reconcile exactly, so the gap is specific to this row. The page now quotes NRMP's published 6.0% and says the row does not reconcile rather than asserting the raw count. Correction, 2026-08-13: this page previously stated that "no match rate has been published yet, because the match is new," and that no hematopathology-specific demographic data existed. The 2026 results were published in February 2026 and are the source above. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6 ↩7

  6. Parent-field figures for pathology. Typical comp ~$370k–$390k with 25th percentile ~$320k, median ~$390k, 75th ~$450k, partners and top subspecialists $500k–$550k+; daytime and weekday work with little traditional call; see the pathology profile on this site for both. Burnout: AMA Organizational Biopsy 2025 — nearly 19,000 physician responses across 106 health systems in 38 states — puts Pathology at 28.3% against a 41.9% all-physician average, third-lowest of the rows it names, https://www.ama-assn.org/practice-management/physician-health/these-9-physician-specialties-report-highest-burnout-rates. Corrected 2026-08-17: the dashboard and the wellbeing section now lead with the AMA row rather than Medscape's ~41%. AMA is the instrument this page prefers wherever it publishes a row, because it is free, primary and current, and pathology is one of the roughly fifteen the Organizational Biopsy breaks out. The two baselines are seven points apart and never share a sentence. The Medscape reading, no longer the page's anchor: 41% against a 49% all-physician average, Physician Burnout & Depression Report 2024, n=9,226, fielded July–October 2023, paywalled and returning HTTP 402. Corrected 2026-08-17: this footnote described the relays as agreeing on every row and named two. Only Healthgrades Pro (https://resources.healthgrades.com/pro/the-most-and-least-burned-out-physicians-by-specialty) prints a pathology row; Advisory Board (https://www.advisory.com/daily-briefing/2024/01/31/physician-burnout) prints six specialties and the 49% baseline, and pathology is not among them. Women in practice and in training: AAMC, "Women are changing the face of medicine in America" (2022 data), https://www.aamc.org/news/women-are-changing-face-medicine-america, which puts anatomic and clinical pathology at 44%, and ACGME, Data Resource Book, Academic Year 2024-2025, Table C.21, https://www.acgme.org/globalassets/pfassets/publicationsbooks/2024-2025_acgme_databook_document.pdf, which puts AP/CP residents at 54.7% and hematopathology fellows at 44.0%. Corrected 2026-08-13. This page carried ~38% women practicing, which is the share across all physicians rather than pathology's own and understated the field by about six points, and "roughly half" for residents. It also said no fellowship-level gender figure existed, on the grounds that the NRMP does not report gender. ACGME does report it, and Table C.21 has the row. DO and IMG shares of the entering class: NRMP, Results and Data: 2026 Main Residency Match, May 2026, Table 2, https://www.nrmp.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/Main_Match_Results_and_Data-2026.pdf, which reports 19.6% DO and 34.7% IMG of pathology's filled positions: of the 634 positions filled, 116 US DO seniors plus 8 US DO graduates is 124, and 50 US-citizen IMGs plus 170 non-US IMGs is 220. Corrected 2026-08-17: this footnote already carried the 2026 figures and then declined to apply them, so the body said "roughly 17% DO and 36% IMG" in four places while the footnote said otherwise — a reader who checked found the page correcting itself against itself. The 2026 pair is now in all four, with the positions-filled denominator stated once in How competitive is it? ⟳ ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4 ↩5 ↩6 ↩7 ↩8

  7. Pathology parent-field compensation. Medscape Physician Compensation Report 2026 ("Positive Signs"), 2025 earnings — pathology $394,000. The report is paywalled and returns HTTP 402, so its 29-row table reaches this page through The DO (American Osteopathic Association), which prints the full list: https://thedo.osteopathic.org/2026/07/what-physicians-are-getting-paid-in-2026/ . Doximity 2025 Physician Compensation Report, 2024 earnings, ~37,000 US physicians surveyed January to December 2024 — pathology $373,384: https://www.doximity.com/reports/physician-compensation-report/2025 . Neither report breaks out a single pathology subspecialty. College of American Pathologists, 2017 Practice Characteristics Survey — mean base $271,144, median base $245,000, mean bonus $69,537, mean total cash $322,791, median total cash $280,000, split academic against non-academic with no subspecialty breakout: https://www.cap.org/article/the-state-of-pathologists-job-market-and-compensation/ . AMN/Merritt Hawkins does not track pathology among the specialties in its recruiting-incentives review. This footnote previously carried a Physicians Thrive compilation of Medscape, Salary.com, Glassdoor and BLS data, with an undisclosed data year, giving hematopathology $226,000–$417,000 and dermatopathology $249,000–$460,000 and calling both among the highest-compensated pathology subspecialties. Salary.com and Glassdoor are aggregators on this site's excluded list; the compilation stated no methodology; its hematopathology midpoint of roughly $322,000 sat below the parent field's own surveyed figure while the surrounding sentence claimed a premium; and its ranking is contradicted by the only real subspecialty data. It was removed rather than relabeled. ⟳ On Salary.com: its CompAnalyst benchmark is HR-reported employer survey data blended with job-posting data, not a physician panel. It is base-weighted and so runs low against total-compensation surveys, and it is used here for percentile structure rather than for levels. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  8. The only compensation data that measures pathology subspecialties against each other, and the field's own job-market survey. Mrak RE, Parslow TG, Ducatman BS, "Benchmarking Subspecialty Practice in Academic Anatomic Pathology: The 2017 Association of Pathology Chairs Survey," Academic Pathology, 2018. PMID 30327790, free full text at https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6178122/ . 43 US academic pathology departments, earnings year 2016, single-subspecialty practitioners. Hematopathology (n=39): 25th percentile $221,177, median $239,857, 75th percentile $290,000, mean $264,197; wRVU medians 4,607 raw, 5,650 by MGMA method, 8,133 by Vizient method. Comparators from the same table: dermatopathology median $347,309 (n=15), gastrointestinal $271,179 (n=13), renal $270,000 (n=19), surgical pathology $245,655 (n=54), cytopathology $239,878 (n=15), neuropathology $220,139 (n=15). Academic practice only, and no newer edition has been published. Starting salary: American Society for Clinical Pathology, 2022 Fellowship and Job Market Surveys, https://ascpcdn.s3.amazonaws.com/static/Membership/pdf/2022_ASCP_Fellowship_And_Job_Market_Surveys.pdf — 128 hematopathology fellows of 304 respondents; "Most job offers included a proposed starting salary between $200,001 and $250,000." The 2017 edition (134 hematopathology fellows), https://s3.amazonaws.com/ascpcdn/static/ASCPResources/Membership/Residents/2017/11_17380_LS_2017+Fellowship+and+Job+Market+Survey.pdf — "The range of $150,000 to $200,000/year was the most frequent salary range reported." ASCP publishes the by-subspecialty detail as an unlabeled bar chart, so those bands are the numeric text the survey gives. A sentence circulating online attributes to ASCP the claim that three-fourths of hematopathologists start above $150,000. That sentence appears in neither PDF and should not be cited. Corrected 2026-08-17: the compensation section attached both salary bands to hematopathology, writing that the survey "covering 128 hematopathology fellows, reports that most job offers came with a proposed starting salary between $200,001 and $250,000." Both sentences are all-fellow summaries. The 2022 one sits under a chart whose legend reads FP HP NP PP TM and summarizes all 304 fellows across the five subspecialties; the 2017 one says outright that "starting annual salaries ranged widely among fellowship groups" before giving its modal range. The scope is now stated in the body, where the disclosure sentence about the unlabelled bar chart already did most of this work. ⟳ ↩ ↩2 ↩3

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