Health Psychologist Salary 2026
Health psychologists typically earn $95,000 to $115,000 in academic medical centers and integrated primary care settings. The BLS does not break out a separate health psychology code; the broader Clinical and Counseling Psychologists category (SOC 19-3033) has a median of $96,100. Pain management, behavioral cardiology, oncology, and bariatric assessment specialists in hospital settings often earn at the top of this range or above with ABPP board certification.
What Health Psychology Is
Health psychology applies psychological theory and intervention to physical health conditions and to health behavior change. It sits at the intersection of psychology and medicine, and health psychologists almost always work embedded in medical settings rather than in stand-alone mental health clinics. The conceptual frame is the biopsychosocial model: physical illness has psychological dimensions (cognition, emotion, behavior, coping) that materially affect disease trajectory, treatment adherence, and patient quality of life. Health psychologists intervene at the psychological layer of medical care.
Typical clinical work includes structured cognitive-behavioral interventions for pain management, smoking cessation counseling, behavioral diabetes management, pre-surgical psychological evaluations (for bariatric surgery candidacy, organ transplant candidacy, spinal cord stimulator implantation, gender-affirming surgery), oncology adjustment counseling, sleep behavioral medicine (CBT for insomnia), behavioral cardiology (Type A pattern, post-MI adjustment, cardiac rehab compliance), and palliative care psychology. The work is shorter-term and more structured than long-term insight-oriented psychotherapy.
The field has grown substantially over the last 25 years because the evidence base for behavioral interventions in chronic disease management has strengthened (especially in diabetes, cardiovascular disease, chronic pain, and weight management) and because the Affordable Care Act and CMS payment reforms incentivized integrated care models that brought psychologists into primary care and specialty medical clinics. Division 38 of the APA, the Society for Health Psychology, is the primary professional home and the journal Health Psychology is the field's flagship publication.
Pay by Setting
The dominant employers of health psychologists are academic medical centers, the VA, integrated primary care systems, and disease-specific specialty clinics. Pay varies by setting, by region, and by board certification status.
| Setting | Typical Range | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Academic Medical Center (AMC) staff | $95,000-$130,000 | Mix of clinical, research, and teaching; ABPP-CHP increasingly expected |
| VA Medical Center (GS-12 to GS-13) | $87,878-$135,987 base + locality | Federal pay scale with locality + benefits stack (see VA salary page) |
| Integrated Primary Care (CoCM model) | $90,000-$115,000 | Embedded in FQHCs, large primary care groups, and hospital outpatient practices |
| Pain Management Clinic | $100,000-$130,000 | CBT-CP and assessment-heavy; often interdisciplinary with anesthesiology |
| Oncology Behavioral Program | $95,000-$125,000 | Major comprehensive cancer centers (NCI-designated) pay at the higher end |
| Bariatric Surgery Assessment | $95,000-$120,000 | Pre-surgical psychological evaluations are insurance-required for most bariatric programs |
| Behavioral Cardiology / Cardiac Rehab | $90,000-$120,000 | Smaller subspecialty; often consultation-liaison structure |
| Academic Research-Heavy (R01-funded) | $80,000-$150,000 | 9-month academic year with summer salary supplement from grant funding; tenure track |
| Industry (medical device, pharma, wellness) | $120,000-$200,000+ | Rare but well-paid; behavioral science roles at large healthcare companies |
Setting-level figures synthesised from sampled academic medical center and VA postings 2025 to 2026, supplemented by Division 38 informal salary discussions and ABPP-CHP cohort experience reporting. Individual offers vary widely with locality, prior experience, and program funding structure.
The CMS CoCM Codes and Why They Matter
A consequential pay-relevant development for health psychology occurred in 2017 when CMS introduced new CPT codes for the Psychiatric Collaborative Care Model (CoCM). The codes (99492 for the initial month of behavioral health care management, 99493 for subsequent months, 99494 for additional time) reimburse the primary care practice that employs a behavioral health care manager and a consulting psychiatric or psychological consultant. The codes gave integrated primary care a clear billing pathway and accelerated the embedding of health psychologists in primary care clinics.
Separately, the Health and Behavior Assessment and Intervention codes (96156 through 96171) reimburse health-psychology-specific work directly. These codes distinguish behavioral interventions targeting physical health conditions from psychotherapy targeting mental health conditions, and they expanded what a health psychologist could bill for in medical settings. Medicare and most commercial insurers cover both code families. The economic effect is that hospital systems and primary care groups can support health psychologist positions on revenue grounds, not just as cost centers, which has expanded job availability.
The reimbursement values vary by locality and payer. Medicare 96156 (Health and Behavior Assessment, initial) reimburses approximately $85 to $110 nationally. 96158 (Health and Behavior Intervention, individual, first 30 minutes) reimburses approximately $50 to $65. 99492 (CoCM initial month) reimburses approximately $160 to $200 to the billing practice (the practice then pays the consulting psychologist on a contractor or employee basis; the per-hour pass-through is roughly $90 to $130). Full current fee schedules are available at the CMS Medicare Physician Fee Schedule.
ABPP-CHP Board Certification
Board certification in Clinical Health Psychology (ABPP-CHP) is issued by the American Board of Clinical Health Psychology, one of the 17 specialty boards under the American Board of Professional Psychology. Requirements include a doctoral degree in psychology from an APA-accredited program, state psychologist licensure, two years of postdoctoral specialty experience in clinical health psychology, submission of a practice sample, and passing both a written and an oral examination.
Board certification has become increasingly important for academic medical center positions and for credentialing with certain hospital systems. The salary premium varies by setting but is consistently in the 10 to 15 percent range for comparable positions. The application and examination process typically takes 12 to 18 months and costs $1,500 to $2,000 in application and examination fees plus the cost of preparation materials. For a mid-career health psychologist earning $105,000, a 10 percent boost of $10,500 per year repays the certification cost in under three months.
Career Path Into Health Psychology
The standard training path mirrors the broader clinical psychology pathway with specialty emphasis at the internship and postdoctoral stages.
- Doctoral degree (5 to 7 years). Most health psychologists hold a PhD or PsyD in clinical psychology with elective training emphasis in health psychology. A smaller number graduate from doctoral programs that offer a formal health psychology track or program of study.
- APA-accredited internship (1 year). Internship sites that offer health psychology training rotations are listed in the APPIC directory. Top training sites include University of Washington, Johns Hopkins, UCLA, Memorial Sloan Kettering, MD Anderson, and a number of VA medical centers.
- Postdoctoral fellowship (2 years for ABPP-CHP pathway). A 2-year specialty postdoc in clinical health psychology satisfies the ABPP-CHP postdoctoral training requirement and is the standard entry pathway. See our postdoctoral fellowship salary page for stipend ranges (typically $50,000 to $65,000 with VA fellowships at the top).
- State licensure as a psychologist. EPPP plus state jurisprudence exam plus accumulated supervised hours, per state board requirements.
- ABPP-CHP board certification (optional but increasingly expected). Pursued 1 to 3 years post-licensure once eligibility hours are accumulated.
The total training pipeline from bachelor's degree through board certification is approximately 11 to 14 years. That is the longest training pathway in psychology other than clinical neuropsychology, which has a similar structure (see the neuropsychologist salary page).