---
title: "Orderly"
description: "Transport patients to areas such as operating rooms or x-ray rooms using wheelchairs, stretchers, or moveable beds. May maintain stocks of supplies or…"
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/orderly"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Orderly

**Category:** Healthcare Support · **SOC code:** 31-1132 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 31-1132.00

Transport patients to areas such as operating rooms or x-ray rooms using wheelchairs, stretchers, or moveable beds. May maintain stocks of supplies or clean and transport equipment. Psychiatric orderlies are included in Psychiatric Aides.

Also advertised as: Attendant; Operating Room Assistant; Orderly; Patient Care Assistant (PCA); Patient Care Technician (PCT); Patient Escort; Patient Transporter; Radiology Transporter.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $38,290 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $18.41/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $32,240 to $50,600, with the middle half between $35,570 and $44,560
- **Total US employment:** 52,440
- **Typical entry education:** High school
- **Preparation required:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +4.0% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 7,200 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 56/100 — 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 52,440 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $32,240 |
| 25th | $35,570 |
| 50th (median) | $38,290 |
| 75th | $44,560 |
| 90th | $50,600 |
| Mean (average) | $40,660 |

### 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 | $49,920 | $45,087 | 4,870 |
| WA | $48,690 | $45,499 | 200 |
| VT | $48,120 | $49,123 | 70 |
| HI | $47,130 | $42,865 | 80 |
| NY | $46,600 | $43,180 | 4,680 |
| OR | $45,120 | $43,653 | 500 |
| MN | $44,550 | $45,173 | 430 |
| DE | $43,800 | $43,884 | 190 |
| CO | $43,570 | $42,280 | 540 |
| ME | $42,530 | $43,823 | 150 |
| WI | $41,380 | $43,977 | 660 |
| NH | $40,850 | $39,217 | 140 |
| PA | $40,140 | $41,139 | 3,550 |
| RI | $39,830 | $38,942 | 210 |
| IL | $39,450 | $39,467 | 2,110 |

33 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 48 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/orderly/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/orderly.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 52,800 in the 2025–2035 base year to 54,900 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 2,100 jobs, or +4.0%. About as fast as average: 4.0% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 7,200 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:** High school diploma or equivalent (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Short-term on-the-job training.

### 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 |
| --- | --- |
| High School Diploma or the equivalent (such as a GED) | 89.3% |
| Less than a High School Diploma | 6.6% |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 4.1% |

## What the work involves

- Transport patients to treatment units, testing units, operating rooms, or other areas, using wheelchairs, stretchers, or moveable beds.
- Lift or assist others to lift patients to move them on or off beds, examination tables, surgical tables, or stretchers.
- Disinfect or sterilize equipment or supplies, using germicides or sterilizing equipment.
- Clean equipment, such as wheelchairs, hospital beds, or portable medical equipment, documenting needed repairs or maintenance.
- Carry messages or documents between departments.
- Transport portable medical equipment or medical supplies between rooms or departments.
- Respond to emergency situations, such as emergency medical calls, security calls, or fire alarms.
- Change soiled linens, such as bed linens, drapes, or cubicle curtains.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Active Listening — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 2.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 2.1 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
- Service Orientation — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Negotiation — importance 2.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 2.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 2.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Customer and Personal Service — importance 4.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Public Safety and Security — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Transportation — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Education and Training — importance 2.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Psychology — importance 2.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Comprehension — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Trunk Strength — importance 3.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Expression — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Problem Sensitivity — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Static Strength — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Recognition — importance 3.4 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), Conventional (C), Social (S).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| R — Realistic | 5.42 |
| C — Conventional | 4.84 |
| S — Social | 4.17 |
| I — Investigative | 2.05 |
| E — Enterprising | 1.19 |
| 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) |
| --- | --- |
| ISFJ | 85.7 |
| ISTJ | 77.1 |
| ESTJ | 70.5 |
| ESFJ | 70.0 |
| ISFP | 60.5 |

Best-fitting types: ISFJ.

## Related occupations

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

- [Nursing Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/nursing-assistant) — median $42,260
- [Ambulance Driver and Attendant, Except Emergency Medical Technicians](https://nuecareer.com/careers/ambulance-driver-and-attendant) — median $35,450
- [Physical Therapist Aide](https://nuecareer.com/careers/physical-therapist-aide) — median $35,240
- [Home Health Aide](https://nuecareer.com/careers/home-health-aide) — median $35,800
- [Surgical Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/surgical-assistant) — median $66,800
- [Surgical Technologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/surgical-technologist) — median $64,650
- [Medical Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/medical-assistant) — median $45,690
- [Psychiatric Aide](https://nuecareer.com/careers/psychiatric-aide) — median $44,910
- [Medical Equipment Preparer](https://nuecareer.com/careers/medical-equipment-preparer) — median $47,700
- [Personal Care Aide](https://nuecareer.com/careers/personal-care-aide) — median $35,800

## 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/orderly