Medical Assistant Jobs in Des Moines, IA: Pay and Who's Hiring

In Des Moines, the May 2025 median is about $46.9K, within 3 percent of the U.S. median and 3% over the Iowa median. The 25th and the 75th are on the table. Those are wages of people already employed, not a quote from a training ad.

Pay

The median is the middle of medical assistants already working, not the wage on a training-program brochure. The 25th is the lower quarter. The 75th is the upper quarter, often people who already room, inject, and keep the front desk from drowning. Compare your certificate and your years with that upper quarter before you accept the middle.

Percentile	Metro	IA	U.S.
25th	$39,520	$38,980	$38,470
Median	$46,920	$45,480	$45,690
75th	$48,970	$48,030	$49,180

Source: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025.

Hiring difficulty and demand

Hiring difficulty

Not on this grid

Metro employment

1,780

National growth, 2025 to 2035

12.9%

National openings a year

109.7 thousand

Who's hiring

Des Moines is outside the provider extract, so employer names are not listed.

License and training

Most states do not issue a medical assistant license. Employers often want a national certificate anyway, and the state still decides which tasks a clinician may delegate. BLS tells readers to check the state because a few places require a credential, a training program, or both. This page states a rule only where a statute or board page was read. If your state is not listed, call the medical board before you assign an injection or a blood draw.

Sources: BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, medical assistants Medical Board of California, medical assistants Florida Statutes section 458.3485, medical assistant N.J.A.C. 13:35-6.4, delegation to certified medical assistants Washington RCW 18.360, medical assistants Washington State Department of Health, medical assistant FAQ AAMA index of state scope pages, used to find the statutes above and not as a substitute for them

The work

The morning is the waiting room and the rooms behind it. You pull the chart, take blood pressure and weight, and ask what the clinician will not have time to restart. Then you stock, sterilize, and answer the call that is really a refill request.

Clinical tasks depend on the state and on what the supervising clinician will put their name on. Scheduling, insurance forms, and supply orders are the half of the job that still has to happen when the last patient is late. Some assistants do both halves. Some offices split them.

A good shift is quiet in the places that matter, because the vitals match the person in the room and the specimen label matches the order. The note in the chart is what the patient said, not the shorter version you were rushing toward.

Nearby metros

Ames, IA · 31 miles
Waterloo, IA · 91 miles
Cedar Rapids, IA · 103 miles
Iowa City, IA · 108 miles

Related roles

One manager hiring: Hire a Medical Assistant in Des Moines.

Medical Assistants hiring pages

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Questions

What do medical assistants earn in Des Moines, IA?

Who hires medical assistants in Des Moines?

Physician offices are the main workplace, with hospitals and outpatient centers behind them. A solo clinic in Des Moines is hiring against those offices, not against a distant health system.

Can a medical assistant give injections in Iowa?

Only if Iowa allows that delegation and the supervisor meets the rule on the state line. This page writes the rule for the states we could source and tells you to check the board everywhere else. Do not borrow another state's duty list for a clinic in Des Moines.

Is Des Moines going to need more medical assistants?

National employment is projected to change 12.9% from 2025 to 2035, with about 109.7 thousand openings a year, and that line describes the country rather than Des Moines. Read Des Moines from the wage table and from roughly a fifth fewer of these workers than a typical metro, then compare it with Ames, IA.