How much can you earn as a forensic nurse?

This must be the first question that arises in your mind when you consider Forensic Nursing as a career – “how much money do forensic nurses make?” A forensic nurse can make money according to her abilities and capacity to work. Many forensic nurses are paid at hourly basis. If you work more you get paid more. Some others get paid per case. Experienced nurses are paid more then the inexperienced ones. So basically it depends on you how much you can earn. Salaries of forensic nurses also vary from place to place. In some cities or states you may get paid better than in others.

Except for Emergency Room Examiners, all other forensic nurses work from outside of hospitals. These nurses are available on call and are paid something between one to four dollars per hour of their service. In the case of sexual assault nurse examiner they are paid one and a half times more then their basic pay rate. Some organizations prefer to pay per case. A forensic nurse may earn anything between one hundred and fifty dollars to four hundred dollars for one case. Again this pay rate may vary from nurse to nurse and from place to place.

At some organizations Forensic Nurses are paid pretty high salary. The starting salary is twenty six dollars per hour. Experienced and efficient nurses can earn up to even hundred dollars per hour. Legal and medical nurse consultants are paid even better. They earn more than one hundred and fifty dollars an hour and there is no upper limit to what they can earn. Forensic nurses can become legal and medical consultants only after they have gained considerable experience in working with victims of physical violence, sexual abuse and trauma.
In forensic nursing, efficiency comes with experience. The more number of cases you have seen and handled, the better your knowledge becomes. Therefore you work much more efficiently. Young Forensic Nurses may not earn as much as their older counterparts but with time and experience one can achieve all desirable heights. Some Forensic nurses, after years of working with hospitals and crime departments, have started their own firms and consultancies where they provide legal and medical aid to victims.

A forensic nurse earns a much higher salary than a standard nurse. That is because a forensic nurse has more education and advanced training than a standard nurse. The job of forensic nursing also involves more responsibility and hard work. Forensic nurses are always on call. As a compensation for odd working hours they are paid more.

Forensic workers work in a variety of settings. Some may work in domestic violence intervention facilities, some in coroner’s office, some as sexual assault nurse examiners, some with crime investigation teams and some give psychiatric training to violent offenders. Forensic Nurses working in different departments may draw different salaries. You can find out which work and pay scale suits you the best and then go for it. Forensic nursing has bright prospects in our society and its very probable that in a few years time forensic nurses may earn much better than what they are getting today.


More in depth information can be found at the forensic nursing website. There are also great inside information on forensic nursing salary