Clinical dietitians assist patients in clinics, hospitals, private practices, prisons, nursing homes, and educational institutions. They develop and implement nutrition programs to improve or maintain the health of patients. They work with patients to determine their condition, dietary needs, preferences, and goals. Furthermore, they develop and implement standards for medical nutrition therapy to enable others to properly administer it to patients and monitor the patient's progress. Additionally, they update their nutrition plan accordingly. Besides that, they conduct research to stay updated on the latest nutrition and food health updates.
To become a clinical dietitian, you need at least a bachelor's degree in nutrition, dietetics, or a related field. You will need a state license to work. You must have previous experience in a related role. Also, you must possess interpersonal, analytical, multitasking, communication, and problem-solving skills. A clinical dietitian earns an average salary of $60,682 per annum. This varies from $43,000 to $85,000.
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a clinical dietitian. For example, did you know that they make an average of $27.87 an hour? That's $57,962 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 11% and produce 8,000 job opportunities across the U.S.
There are certain skills that many clinical dietitians have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed analytical skills, compassion and listening skills.
If you're interested in becoming a clinical dietitian, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 72.9% of clinical dietitians have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 20.3% of clinical dietitians have master's degrees. Even though most clinical dietitians have a college degree, it's impossible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a clinical dietitian. When we researched the most common majors for a clinical dietitian, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or master's degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on clinical dietitian resumes include associate degree degrees or doctoral degree degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a clinical dietitian. In fact, many clinical dietitian jobs require experience in a role such as dietetic internship. Meanwhile, many clinical dietitians also have previous career experience in roles such as dietitian or registered dietitian.