How To Become A Medical Engineer: What It Is and Career Path

What is a medical engineer and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

2 min read

Quoted expert

Colin Briskey

There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a medical engineer. For example, did you know that they make an average of $44.91 an hour? That's $93,405 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 10% and produce 1,700 job opportunities across the U.S.

What general advice would you give to a medical engineer?

Colin Briskey

Visiting Assistant Professor of Voice, University of Massachusetts - Lowell

While I would give slightly different advice for someone who is soon to graduate, has graduated and is looking for a job, or has graduated and is starting a job, there are some universal pieces of advice that I've found useful.1) Your environment should be full of opportunities. Take advantage of them. Whether there are technical/soft skill training opportunities inside/outside the institution, or opportunities to simply observe a senior personnel doing what you hope to do one day, pursue the opportunities that interest you and match with your professional goals the most. If you find yourself in an organization that doesn't create opportunities for their employees/students, you may want to look for another organization. 2) Along those lines, find your people. There are a seemingly infinite number of quotes that reflect the sentiment, but the idea is that you'll be influenced most by those around you; not the geographical region or the size/shape of your desk. As you look toward your next position/opportunity, consider how the values of that institution match with yours. If they don't, there's no amount of pay and compensation that will keep you happy in that position after 3-5 years.

ScoreMedical EngineerUS Average

Salary

7.3

Avg. Salary $93,405

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

5.4

Growth rate 10%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

2.3

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.86%

Asian 17.54%

Black or African American 7.16%

Hispanic or Latino 7.78%

Unknown 4.94%

White 61.72%

Gender

female 18.92%

male 81.08%

Age - 33

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 33

Stress level

5.4

Stress level is manageable

7.1 - high

Complexity level

8.3

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

6.4

Work life balance is fair

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a medical engineer

Explore medical engineer education requirements

Most common medical engineer degrees

Bachelor's

53.1 %

Associate

20.4 %

Master's

14.3 %

Start to develop specific medical engineer skills

Skills	Percentages
R	16.12%
Hospital Equipment	13.63%
Design Verification	10.06%
MRI	7.34%
Medical Devices	6.47%

Complete relevant medical engineer training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 3-6 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New medical engineers learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a medical engineer based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real medical engineer resumes.

Research medical engineer duties and responsibilities

Accomplish QA of inspector worksheets during shipboard inspection, and generate certification report for government approval.
Propose and implement an architecture with significantly improve availability characteristics.
Propose and implement an architecture with significantly improve availability characteristics.

Apply for medical engineer jobs

Now it's time to start searching for a medical engineer job. Consider the tips below for a successful job search:

Browse job boards for relevant postings
Consult your professional network
Reach out to companies you're interested in working for directly
Watch out for job scams

How do medical engineers rate their job?

-/5

5 stars

4 stars

3 stars

2 stars

1 star

Medical engineer reviews

A zippia user wrote a review on Jun 2019

Pros

Inventing smart ways of mproving human lives.

Cons

Low salary compared to other engineering fields.