Pain Medicine (Anesthesiology) Physician: how many are there, and how many are in private practice?

National totals

What this specialty covers

An anesthesiologist who provides a high level of care, either as a primary physician or consultant, for patients experiencing problems with acute, chronic and/or cancer pain in both hospital and ambulatory settings. Patient care needs are also coordinated with other specialists.

Reading the sole-proprietor share

For this specialty, 948 records, or 12.1%, are flagged as sole proprietors in NPPES. Because this is a self-reported field, it is an imperfect proxy for private practice and does not directly identify employment arrangements or practice ownership.

By state

New NPI registrations by year

Counts reflect the year each NPI was first issued, among records still active today. The final year is partial: this data covers through 2026-01-11.

Data notes

• The sole-proprietor field is self-reported by the provider in NPPES and is an imperfect proxy for private practice.
• A sole-proprietor count shown as <11 is suppressed: the true value is below 11, which could include zero.
• The count reflects active NPI records with this taxonomy as the primary classification, not necessarily unique practicing physicians.
• A primary taxonomy does not capture every clinician who provides pain care or describe the full scope of a practice.
• Providers are counted once, by their primary taxonomy code only.

Source: CMS National Plan and Provider Enumeration System (NPPES) Data Dissemination file, FOIA-disclosable public data under CMS-6060-N. Aggregated by Hero EMR on 2026-08-03; deactivated NPIs excluded; specialty assigned from the primary taxonomy code (NUCC 25.1). Counts below 11 are suppressed. Individual providers are never published. All provider data pages.

Common questions