The average salary of mental health therapists in the USA is $48,000 to $83,000 depending on location, skill, experience, and education level. In this article, you will get some insight into the mental health therapist’s salary.
What are mental health counselors?
These professionals have the license to treat various emotional, mental, behavioral, and cognitive conditions in a person. They also assist people who suffer from substance abuse problems. They help identify the stress factors in someone’s life, encourage healthy living and work on improving mental health. They may work with physicians and doctors in several cases depending upon the necessity. If a person suffers from substance abuse, they will assist in behavioral therapy and can even diagnose the person in some cases. They come up with a plan for their patients or even recommend some good healthcare service depending upon their condition.
Factors that affect the salary of a mental health therapist
Some common factors that influence how high or low their salary can be are experience, skillset, education level, and location.
- You earn more as you grow older and gain more expertise in the field of mental health. When people want to visit a therapist, they prefer to go to the ones with ample experience because they have dealt with more cases and know more than someone fairly new.
- If you live in bigger cities, there will be more job opportunities and promotion chances along with the number of patients you can get. In small cities, the population is less, and there aren’t many opportunities to advance your career.
Some things you can do to increase your salary in this field
- You should look out for the in-demand skills so you can add them to your resume and stand out in the field.
- You can have conversations with your patients that will help them deal with any emotions that might be affecting their state. If they are suffering from any problem, you need to help them deal with it calmly.
- You can provide a diagnosis to the patient, but you need to be adept at assessing the situation properly.
- Different individuals need different treatment plans, so you need to assess their needs and end goals properly to provide the best treatment.
- You should know the other medical professionals that can provide better healthcare to your patient and provide them with resources that will be helpful.
- If you want to stand out, you can teach mental health classes, do some volunteer work or even conduct some resourceful seminars, so your superior notices it. You can also help your superior with some extra or emergency workload and get that increment.
- Small things count, so make sure that you document every relevant task you finished and let your superior know during the performance review. Make them see how much you have contributed to the institution and will continue to do so.
If you keep these things in mind, you can advance in your career as a mental health therapist.
