What Does a Community Health Worker Do?

We looked at the average community health worker annual salary and compared it with the average of an assistant director of nutrition and wellness programs. Generally speaking, assistant directors of nutrition and wellness programs receive $40,244 higher pay than community health workers per year.

These skill sets are where the common ground ends though. A community health worker responsibility is more likely to require skills like "patients," "community health," "social work," and "community resources." Whereas a assistant director of nutrition and wellness programs requires skills like "corporate wellness programs," "health education programs," "mental health," and "data collection." Just by understanding these different skills you can see how different these careers are.

Assistant directors of nutrition and wellness programs tend to reach higher levels of education than community health workers. In fact, assistant directors of nutrition and wellness programs are 5.3% more likely to graduate with a Master's Degree and 4.0% more likely to have a Doctoral Degree.

The next role we're going to look at is the health educator profession. Typically, this position earns a higher pay. In fact, they earn a $5,491 higher salary than community health workers per year.

A similarity between the two careers of community health workers and health educators are a few of the skills associated with both roles. We used resumes from both professions to find that both use skills like "patients," "community health," and "social work. "

But both careers also use different skills, according to real community health worker resumes. While community health worker responsibilities can utilize skills like "chw," "social services," "health education," and "care coordination," some health educators use skills like "health promotion," "health education programs," "weight management," and "mental health."

On average, health educators earn a higher salary than community health workers. There are industries that support higher salaries in each profession respectively. Interestingly enough, health educators earn the most pay in the education industry with an average salary of $44,289. Whereas, community health workers have higher paychecks in the insurance industry where they earn an average of $37,529.

In general, health educators study at higher levels of education than community health workers. They're 7.2% more likely to obtain a Master's Degree while being 4.0% more likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.

The third profession we take a look at is lay health advocate. On an average scale, these workers bring in lower salaries than community health workers. In fact, they make a $1,953 lower salary per year.

By looking over several community health workers and lay health advocates resumes, we found that both roles utilize similar skills, such as "patients," "social work," and "community resources." But beyond that the careers look very different.

As mentioned, these two careers differ between other skills that are required for performing the work exceedingly well. For example, gathering from community health workers resumes, they are more likely to have skills like "community health," "chw," "care coordination," and "primary care." But a lay health advocate might have skills like "behavioral health," "hipaa," "mental illness," and "mental health issues."

Lay health advocates make a very good living in the education industry with an average annual salary of $36,985. Whereas community health workers are paid the highest salary in the insurance industry with the average being $37,529.

Lay health advocates are known to earn similar educational levels when compared to community health workers. Additionally, they're 0.3% less likely to graduate with a Master's Degree, and 0.8% less likely to earn a Doctoral Degree.

Now, we'll look at health outreach workers, who generally average a lower pay when compared to community health workers annual salary. In fact, the difference is about $4,950 per year.

While their salaries may vary, community health workers and health outreach workers both use similar skills to perform their jobs. Resumes from both professions include skills like "patients," "community health," and "social work. "

While some skills are shared by these professions, there are some differences to note. "chw," "primary care," "home health," and "community services" are skills that have shown up on community health workers resumes. Additionally, health outreach worker uses skills like health system, money management, child abuse, and mental health issues on their resumes.

In general, health outreach workers make a higher salary in the insurance industry with an average of $35,581. The highest community health worker annual salary stems from the insurance industry.

Health outreach workers reach similar levels of education when compared to community health workers. The difference is that they're 0.4% more likely to earn a Master's Degree less, and 0.7% more likely to graduate with a Doctoral Degree.