---
title: "Nuclear Medicine Technologist"
description: "Prepare, administer, and measure radioactive isotopes in therapeutic, diagnostic, and tracer studies using a variety of radioisotope equipment. Prepare…"
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/nuclear-medicine-technologist"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Nuclear Medicine Technologist

**Category:** Healthcare Practitioners and Technical · **SOC code:** 29-2033 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 29-2033.00

Prepare, administer, and measure radioactive isotopes in therapeutic, diagnostic, and tracer studies using a variety of radioisotope equipment. Prepare stock solutions of radioactive materials and calculate doses to be administered by radiologists. Subject patients to radiation. Execute blood volume, red cell survival, and fat absorption studies following standard laboratory techniques.

Also advertised as: Certified Nuclear Medicine Technologist (CNMT); Nuclear Cardiology Technologist; Nuclear Medicine PET-CT Technologist (Nuclear Medicine Positron Emission Tomography - Computed Tomography Technologist); Nuclear Medicine Technologist (NMT); Radiation Safety Officer; Registered Nuclear Medicine Technologist; Staff Nuclear Medicine Technologist.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $101,370 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $48.74/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $78,080 to $134,500, with the middle half between $86,720 and $117,120
- **Total US employment:** 17,080
- **Typical entry education:** Associate's
- **Preparation required:** Some preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +4.4% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 800 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 50/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 17,080 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $78,080 |
| 25th | $86,720 |
| 50th (median) | $101,370 |
| 75th | $117,120 |
| 90th | $134,500 |
| Mean (average) | $105,160 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| CA | $162,380 | $146,658 | 1,500 |
| WA | $126,200 | $117,930 | 320 |
| HI | $125,650 | $114,278 | 30 |
| NJ | $124,280 | $114,223 | 540 |
| OR | $122,100 | $118,130 | 180 |
| NY | $118,650 | $109,942 | 890 |
| MA | $118,250 | $111,813 | 380 |
| CT | $117,150 | $113,068 | 170 |
| CO | $116,990 | $113,525 | 200 |
| DC | $116,630 | $106,123 | 30 |
| UT | $111,770 | $113,054 | 120 |
| NV | $109,150 | $109,173 | 120 |
| NH | $107,890 | $103,576 | 60 |
| MN | $107,380 | $108,881 | 200 |
| IL | $104,950 | $104,994 | 620 |

35 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 50 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/nuclear-medicine-technologist/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/nuclear-medicine-technologist.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 17,400 in the 2025–2035 base year to 18,200 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 800 jobs, or +4.4%. About as fast as average: 4.4% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 800 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** Associate's degree (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Some preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Three: Medium Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** None.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| Associate's Degree or other 2-year degree | 62.6% |
| Bachelor's Degree | 21.5% |
| Post-Baccalaureate Certificate | 5.8% |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 4.2% |
| First Professional Degree | 4.1% |
| Some College Courses | 1.8% |

## What the work involves

- Administer radiopharmaceuticals or radiation intravenously to detect or treat diseases, using radioisotope equipment, under direction of a physician.
- Detect and map radiopharmaceuticals in patients' bodies, using a camera to produce photographic or computer images.
- Produce a computer-generated or film image for interpretation by a physician.
- Explain test procedures and safety precautions to patients and provide them with assistance during test procedures.
- Dispose of radioactive materials and store radiopharmaceuticals, following radiation safety procedures.
- Maintain and calibrate radioisotope and laboratory equipment.
- Perform quality control checks on laboratory equipment or cameras.
- Calculate, measure, and record radiation dosage or radiopharmaceuticals received, used, and disposed, using computer and following physician's prescription.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Critical Thinking — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Science — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Operations Monitoring — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Operation and Control — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Customer and Personal Service — importance 4.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Biology — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Physics — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Medicine and Dentistry — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Chemistry — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Comprehension — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Expression — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Problem Sensitivity — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Near Vision — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Information Ordering — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Realistic (R), Investigative (I), Conventional (C).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| R — Realistic | 5.99 |
| I — Investigative | 5.57 |
| C — Conventional | 5.20 |
| S — Social | 3.08 |
| E — Enterprising | 1.31 |
| A — Artistic | 1.00 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ISTJ | 88.8 |
| ISTP | 77.9 |
| ISFJ | 75.0 |
| INTJ | 71.4 |
| ESTJ | 66.9 |

Best-fitting types: ISTJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Cardiovascular Technologist and Technician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/cardiovascular-technologist-and-technician) — median $74,310
- [Radiologic Technologist and Technician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/radiologic-technologist-and-technician) — median $80,110
- [Radiation Therapist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/radiation-therapist) — median $105,310
- [Medical and Clinical Laboratory Technologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/medical-and-clinical-laboratory-technologist) — median $62,930
- [Radiologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/radiologist) — median $420,860
- [Magnetic Resonance Imaging Technologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/magnetic-resonance-imaging-technologist) — median $95,480
- [Medical and Clinical Laboratory Technician](https://nuecareer.com/careers/medical-and-clinical-laboratory-technician) — median $62,930
- [Neurodiagnostic Technologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/neurodiagnostic-technologist) — median $50,290
- [Diagnostic Medical Sonographer](https://nuecareer.com/careers/diagnostic-medical-sonographer) — median $96,590
- [Medical Dosimetrist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/medical-dosimetrist) — median $147,470

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BLS OOH** — BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2025–2035 edition. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/nuclear-medicine-technologist