Therapy Staffing: What It Costs to Staff PTs, OTs, and SLPs — Including the Number That Argues Against Us

Last updated August 24, 2026

Therapy staffing agencies typically charge 30–45% markups on contract therapists (allied-health rates) and 18–25% of first-year salary for direct placements — $17,947.80–$24,927.50 on a median PT salary. And here's the number we publish against our own interest: in our benchmark, therapy is the most expensive role family we track to advertise for — $74.62 per applicant at a 5% apply rate. This page explains why, and which tool actually fits which therapy hiring problem.

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A note on who's writing this — and why we lead with our worst number

Boostpoint runs recruitment advertising, and on most pages of this site our data makes the case for it. This page is different. Therapy is the hardest role family in our 2026 benchmark, and pretending otherwise would be exactly the vendor behavior we criticize elsewhere. So the structure here is honest triage: what agencies charge, why advertising for licensed clinicians is genuinely expensive, and where each tool — including ours — actually earns its cost. The rest of our healthcare pages cover the roles where the math flips.

Why therapy staffing is hard: the supply math

Every number on this page follows from one fact: demand for therapists is growing much faster than the pipeline that produces them. Per the Bureau of Labor Statistics' current projections, physical therapist employment is growing 14% and speech-language pathologist employment 15% over their projection decades — several times the all-occupation average — with roughly 13,600 and 13,300 annual openings respectively. BLS's 2024–34 industry projections rank therapy offices among the fifteen fastest-growing industries in the economy at 23.3% growth, driven by the aging population. Meanwhile the supply side moves slowly: a PT license requires a Doctor of Physical Therapy — roughly seven years of higher education — and every state licenses the profession.

Fast-growing demand, slow-growing supply, universal licensure: that's a seller's market for clinicians. Both of the prices below — the agency's and ours — are just that market showing up on an invoice.

What therapy staffing agencies charge

In dollars, using BLS median salaries: a direct-hire fee on a $99,710 median PT salary runs $17,947.80 at 18% and $24,927.50 at 25%. On a $95,410 median SLP salary, the same range is $17,173.80 to $23,852.50. Those are large checks — and for a single vacant caseload bleeding referrals, they are often rational ones, which is not something we say lightly on a page that sells the alternative.

Our own data: the most expensive role family we track

Across the 891 campaigns in our benchmark, here's what applicants cost by healthcare role family — with therapy where it always lands:

Median cost per applicant by role family, 2026 Social Job Advertising Benchmark. Apply rates: caregiver 31%, CNA 18%, LPN 21%, RN 11%, allied 10%, therapy 5%.

Why the number is what it is

Across our whole dataset, what happens after the click — the apply rate — explains 70% of cost variation, far more than creative or delivery. Campaigns converting under 5% of clickers average $53.77 per applicant; campaigns above 35% average $1.61. Therapy lives in that worst band, and for structural reasons rather than fixable ones: employed clinicians with full caseloads don't fill out application forms from an ad. They're reachable — the ads get clicked — but a licensed professional considering a job change books a conversation; they don't submit. That behavior caps what any advertising campaign can do for a scarce clinician opening, ours included.

When a therapy staffing agency is the right call

• A single vacant clinician caseload, now. An unfilled PT schedule turns away referrals daily. A recruiter with a warm network of licensed clinicians beats a cold campaign into a 5%-apply audience — the fee prices access you can't advertise your way into quickly.
• Coverage with an end date. Maternity leave, a clinician's sabbatical, a census bump: contract therapy staffing at a 30–45% markup exists precisely for gaps that shouldn't become permanent hires.
• New service lines needing credentials on day one. Opening pediatric OT or adding SLP coverage requires a licensed hire before revenue starts; placement fees are part of the launch cost.

Where advertising still earns its keep in therapy staffing

The honest version of our pitch for therapy providers is narrower than for other healthcare roles — and real inside its lane:

Two practical notes on the advertising lane. First, budget expectations should match the math: at the $74.62 therapy median, a $334 median-budget campaign yields roughly four clinician applicants a month — a drip that makes sense as an always-on background channel, not as the plan for filling this month's vacancy. Second, the assistants-and-support lane behaves like the rest of frontline healthcare, not like clinician hiring: bigger pool, normal apply rates, and the same in-platform application mechanics that drive our CNA and caregiver numbers. Providers who advertise continuously for the reachable roles and reserve fees for the scarce ones stop paying scarcity prices for non-scarce hires.

The blended playbook for rehab providers

• Advertise always-on for assistants and support — the roles with normal apply rates — and keep those seats off the fee ledger entirely.
• Run a low-budget clinician presence continuously. Clinicians change jobs rarely; being the clinic they already know when they do is cheap insurance at drip budgets.
• Reserve agency fees for the scarce and the urgent, and negotiate them knowing the market: 18–25% direct hire and 30–45% contract markups are ranges, not laws — multi-placement relationships move them. Our markup and fees page covers the negotiating levers.
• Protect retention like a recruiting channel. In a 5%-apply market, every clinician you keep is a placement fee you don't pay. Caseload caps, schedule control, and CEU support are cheaper than the alternative invoice.
• Compare everything against your full healthcare staffing cost picture — therapy decisions made in isolation tend to normalize scarcity pricing for every role in the building.

Frequently asked questions

Agency figures are third-party ranges from AMN Healthcare (30–45% allied-health contract markups; 18–25% direct-hire fees) and DirectShifts/SkillGigs (40–70% travel-nursing premiums, cited as the published adjacent range — travel therapy is priced by the same firms but we found no equivalently published therapy-specific range). Salary figures are BLS medians ($99,710 PT, May 2023; $95,410 SLP); fee dollar examples multiply those salaries by the stated percentages and resolve exactly. Growth projections are BLS Employment Projections (PT 14%, 2023–33; SLP 15% and ~13,300 annual openings, 2024–34; ~13,600 annual PT openings; therapy offices industry 23.3%, 2024–34; assistant/aide growth 30%+ as reported from BLS projections). Advertising figures ($74.62 therapy and $54.37 allied medians, role-family medians and apply rates, apply-rate band costs $53.77 and $1.61, 70% of cost variation explained by conversion, $334 median budget) come from the 2026 Social Job Advertising Benchmark — 891 campaigns, 1,334 campaign-months, costs inclusive of campaign management. Cost per applicant is not cost per hire. This is a sample of Boostpoint campaigns, not an industry-wide study.