Methodology & Data Sources

All salary figures on this site come from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) program and supplemental verified provider data — never from AI-generated estimates or unverified sources.

Why This Page Exists

Healthcare is a YMYL (Your Money or Your Life) topic. Salary figures influence career decisions; licensing data affects professional compliance; hospital information is used by both patients and staff. Inaccurate or fabricated data causes real harm. This page documents precisely where every number comes from and how we keep it current.

Salary Data

Primary Source: BLS OEWS

Occupational salary data is sourced from the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) program, the most authoritative national source for US occupational wages. The OEWS covers approximately 830 occupations and publishes state- and metro-level estimates annually.

Supplemental Sources

For specialties or geographies with limited BLS coverage, we supplement with verified data from licensed third-party salary data providers. Each supplemental data record carries its own source, source_url, and last_verified_date field.

Freshness Policy

Every salary record must have a last_verified_date within 90 days of publication. Stale records trigger an automatic re-pull from the authoritative source before any page using that data can be published or updated.

What We Never Do

• We do not ask AI language models (ChatGPT, Claude, etc.) to supply or confirm salary figures.
• We do not publish salary pages when no reliable data exists for a specialty/location combination.
• We do not use floating-point arithmetic for money — all values are stored as precise decimals.

Pay Period Calculations

• Annual → Hourly: annual ÷ 2,080 (40 hrs/week × 52 weeks)
• Weekly: hourly × 36 (standard nursing shift hours; configurable per specialty)
• Monthly: annual ÷ 12
• Overtime: hourly × 1.5 × overtime hours (federal default; state variations noted)

Licensing Data

State licensing requirements (fees, renewal cycles, CE hours, compact status, processing times) are sourced directly from each state's official licensing board websites. We link to the official board URL on every licensing page. Records carry alast_verified_date and are reviewed when state boards publish changes.

Compact license status is sourced from the Nurse Licensure Compact (NLC) and other relevant compact organizations.

Certification Data

Certification details (exam format, costs, validity, CE credits, prerequisites) are sourced from the issuing body's official website. Examples: AACN for CCRN/PCCN, AHA for BLS/ACLS, ENA for CEN. We link to the official issuing body on every certification page.

Hospital Data

Hospital profile data (bed counts, Magnet status, teaching status, specialties) is sourced from official providers. Patient and employee ratings are only displayed where a legitimate, documented rating_source exists. We never fabricate, estimate, or scrape ratings.

Magnet hospital status is verified against the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) Magnet Recognition Program.

Confidence Levels

Every data record on this site carries one of three confidence levels:

• High — sourced directly from the authoritative primary source (BLS, official state board, issuing body). Most records.
• Medium — sourced from a verified secondary provider with documented methodology.
• Low — estimated or interpolated. Pages using low-confidence data are clearly labeled and may be suppressed pending better data.

Content Generation & Verification

Blog and guide content on this site may be AI-assisted (OpenAI generation), but every piece is verified against our governed datasets by the Anthropic Claude API and then reviewed and approved by a human editor before publication. AI models are used to verify that written content accurately reflects validated data — never as a source of figures themselves.

Reporting Errors

If you spot an inaccurate figure, an outdated license rule, or a factual error, please report it here. We take data accuracy seriously and will investigate within 5 business days.

Contact

Questions about our data methodology: info@healthtalentstaffing.com