The job market this week · 26 Oct to 1 Nov 2026
Healthcare hiring, 26 Oct to 1 Nov 2026: CVS pharmacy jobs lead a 4.8% rise
Open jobs at the employers we read all week rose 4.8% from 26 Oct to 1 Nov 2026, led by pharmacy; median posted pay was $41.62 an hour; plus the week's nurse strikes, contracts and cuts.
CareJobs.Now research team · Published
At the 265 employers whose career sites we read all week, open healthcare jobs rose 4.8% in the week of Monday 26 October to Sunday 1 November 2026, from 179,598 to 188,283, with 43,224 new listings. Their median posted hourly pay was $41.62, against $41.90 a week earlier.
The board itself grew to 444,849 open jobs at 5,531 employers by the end of the week, because we began reading many more employers' own career sites. We also stopped reading a few, among them Henry Ford Health, Emory Healthcare, U.S. Physical Therapy and USAJOBS, whose job sites' robots.txt files ask crawlers to stay out. Neither change says anything about hiring, so every rise or fall here is measured only at the employers we read from before the week through its end (the method explains it). Outside our board, Brigham and Women's nurses set a new strike date and Allegheny General nurses won a contract, each listed below with its source.
- jobs open on the board at the end of 1 Nov 2026
- 444,849
- change in open jobs at the 265 employers we read all through the week
- +4.8%
- new listings at those employers
- 43,224
- jobs taken down on the board in the week
- 80,637
Where hiring moved
Pharmacy jobs rose most for a second week: open pharmacist and pharmacy technician jobs at those employers went from 8,053 to 10,248, up 27.3%, as CVS Health grew from 3,658 to 6,028 open jobs with 2,681 new listings, after the rise last week reported.
Nurse and LPN jobs, the largest kind on the board, rose 5.4%, from 65,955 to 69,545, with 16,633 new listings. Caregiver jobs rose 6%, mental health and social work jobs 5.9%, physician jobs 4.9%, imaging jobs 3.9%, nursing assistant and patient care tech jobs 3.8% and therapy jobs 3.3%. Patient access, coding and admin jobs fell 2.3% and dental jobs 1.9%, the only kinds of job to fall.
Among staffing agencies, Advantis Medical grew from 7,989 to 10,088 open jobs with 2,520 new listings, and Cross Country Healthcare posted 3,779 new listings while taking down 3,190, ending the week with 11,156. DaVita posted 1,028 new listings and ended the week with 2,935 open jobs against 2,499.
Part of the rise is ours rather than hiring. On 29 October the board began reading the whole job boards of BAYADA Home Health Care and Vohra Wound Physicians, where it had read only part of each before, so some jobs they had listed earlier reached us only during the week and count as new: BAYADA's 957 new listings took it from 1,644 to 2,410 open jobs, and Vohra's 473, with none taken down, from 1,134 to 1,607.
What the jobs paid
Posted pay barely moved. The median hourly rate stated by nurse and LPN jobs at the comparable employers was $47.50 (a week earlier $47.50), therapy jobs $47.57, imaging $47.39, lab techs and phlebotomists $31.58, medical assistants $24.63, nursing assistants $22.87 and caregivers $19.00.
The pharmacy median fell from $32.37 to $31.38 in the week its open jobs grew most, so the mix of jobs posted moved it. The physician median fell from $131.00 to $125.00 and the nurse practitioner and physician assistant median rose from $76.47 to $78.14. Both rest on few stated rates (470 and 1,269 at the week's end), so the jobs posted in a single week move them; how each kind of job pays across the whole board is in the healthcare pay rate card.
Hiring news
What was reported about healthcare employers and hiring this week, each item with the outlet that reported it.
Allegheny General nurses ratify a three-year contract
About 1,500 nurses at Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh approved on 26 October a three-year contract that runs to 13 October 2029, after voting on 15 October to authorize a strike. Their union says it raises pay by an average of nearly 16% over the contract, with at least $8 an hour more for nurses licensed for more than five years, and WESA puts the wage investment at $35 million; the contract also limits forced rotations between day and night shifts.
Source: 90.5 WESA, 28 Oct 2026
Santa Rosa Memorial nurses begin a two-day strike
Nearly 800 registered nurses represented by the Staff Nurses Association began a two-day strike at Providence Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital in California on 27 October, after their contract expired on 30 September and months of negotiations. The hospital said it had contracted nurses to temporarily replace those on strike.
Source: The Press Democrat, 27 Oct 2026
Mass General Brigham pauses Home Hospital at three hospitals as layoffs begin
As its second round of layoffs began, Mass General Brigham is pausing the clinical operations of its Home Hospital program indefinitely at Salem Hospital, Newton-Wellesley Hospital and Brigham and Women's Faulkner Hospital, according to a memo reported by the Boston Globe, and refocusing it on Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's. The program, which the Globe says loses $30 million a year on average, plans to treat no more than 30 patients, down from about 70 in 2024; the system did not say how many workers it is laying off.
Source: 105.7 WROR (reporting the Boston Globe), 27 Oct 2026
Watsonville Community Hospital board votes to close maternity and NICU
The Pajaro Valley Health Care District board voted 3 to 2 on 28 October to close Watsonville Community Hospital's maternity services, including labor and delivery, and its neonatal intensive care unit, where about 58 nurses work. The hospital must give the state 120 days' notice and keeps both units open meanwhile, and the board can reverse the decision if funding arrives; interim chief executive Tim Moran told Lookout the units lose roughly $10 million a year.
Source: Lookout Santa Cruz, 29 Oct 2026
Labor board sets union election for CommonSpirit Memorial nurses in Chattanooga
The National Labor Relations Board scheduled a secret-ballot election on 17 November and 18 November for registered nurses at CommonSpirit Memorial Hospital in Chattanooga, Tennessee, to decide whether to join National Nurses United; about 700 nurses are eligible to vote.
Source: Chattanooga Times Free Press, 28 Oct 2026
Brigham nurses give notice of an open-ended strike from 12 November
More than 4,000 nurses at Brigham and Women's Hospital, represented by the Massachusetts Nurses Association, gave notice on 1 November of an open-ended strike from 12 November, after rejecting Mass General Brigham's last, best and final offer, which did not include across-the-board raises; talks resume on 9 November with a federal mediator. Mass General Brigham says its Brigham nurses start at $86,700 a year and earn at least $220,000 after 20 years of service.
Sources: NBC10 Boston, 1 Nov 2026; The Boston Globe, 1 Nov 2026; Boston 25 News, 1 Nov 2026
The week in our data
26 Oct 2026 to 1 Nov 2026, read from the careers sites of the 5,531 employers with open jobs on CareJobs.Now. Each count opens the live list, which keeps moving after this week.
Open jobs by kind of job
The board's count at the end of 1 Nov 2026, then the same kind at the 265 employers we read all through the week, from the start of 26 Oct 2026 to the end of 1 Nov 2026. Median pay is the middle posted hourly rate at those employers, shown where at least 3 jobs state one at both ends.
Biggest moves at the comparable employers
- CVS Health: 3,658 to 6,028 open jobs, 2,681 new listings and 311 taken down.
- Advantis Medical: 7,989 to 10,088 open jobs, 2,520 new listings and 421 taken down.
- BAYADA Home Health Care: 1,644 to 2,410 open jobs, 957 new listings and 191 taken down.
- Cross Country Healthcare: 10,567 to 11,156 open jobs, 3,779 new listings and 3,190 taken down.
- Vohra Wound Physicians: 1,134 to 1,607 open jobs, 473 new listings and 0 taken down.
- DaVita: 2,499 to 2,935 open jobs, 1,028 new listings and 592 taken down.
How this post is counted
- The week is the last full week, Monday to Sunday (UTC), before the day of publication. A job is open at a moment when the employer's careers site lists it then; a new listing is one first listed during the week; a job taken down is one no longer listed.
- Every "rose" or "fell" is measured on the employers we read all through the week, like for like: employers tracked since before the week ahead of it, listing open jobs both when that week began and when this one ended. An employer whose careers site was read for the first time adds its whole open catalog at once, and one we stopped reading (its site's robots.txt closed to us, or its board moved) drops its whole catalog at once; both are changes in what the board reads, not in hiring, so neither is counted. The board's own totals are given too, as its size.
- Pay is the posted hourly rate (the middle of a stated range) on those employers' jobs; a median is given only where at least 3 jobs state one, the fewest any pay figure on this site is measured from.
- Hiring news comes from the outlet or employer named under each item, linked and dated. The post's words are fixed on its day; a correction is added below them with its date.
Cite and follow
CareJobs.Now (2026). Healthcare hiring, 26 Oct to 1 Nov 2026: CVS pharmacy jobs lead a 4.8% rise. https://carejobs.now/news/2026-11-02
Free to quote with credit under CC BY 4.0. The monthly view of the same market is in the monthly data stories, every figure in the research reports.