What is a Dietary Aide?

If you've ever had the dream of telling people what to eat, you might do well as a dietary aide. These aides are there for people who want to learn more about leading a healthy lifestyle or reaching a specific health-related goal.

Dietary aides are needed in hospitals, nursing homes, clincis, cafeterias, and even in state and local governments. Through supervised training, and a bachelor's degree, you'll be putting together healthy meal plans in no time.

What Does a Dietary Aide Do

There are certain skills that many dietary aides 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 communication skills, customer-service skills and detail oriented.

Learn more about what a Dietary Aide does

How To Become a Dietary Aide

If you're interested in becoming a dietary aide, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 15.9% of dietary aides have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 1.1% of dietary aides have master's degrees. Even though some dietary aides have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.

Learn More About How To Become a Dietary Aide
Top Dietary Aide Jobs Near You

Dietary Aide Career Paths

As you move along in your career, you may start taking on more responsibilities or notice that you've taken on a leadership role. Using our career map, a dietary aide can determine their career goals through the career progression. For example, they could start out with a role such as certified nursing assistant, progress to a title such as licensed practical nurse and then eventually end up with the title registered nurse supervisor.

Dietary Aide

Average Salary for a Dietary Aide

Dietary Aides in America make an average salary of $28,005 per year or $13 per hour. The top 10 percent makes over $35,000 per year, while the bottom 10 percent under $22,000 per year.
Average Dietary Aide Salary
$28,005 Yearly
$13.46 hourly
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Roles and Types of Dietary Aide

The role of a dietary aide includes a wide range of responsibilities. These responsibilities can vary based on an individual's specific job, company, or industry.Here are some general dietary aide responsibilities:

  • Works in food service department under direct supervision of food service director
  • Cannot pose a direct threat to health or safety of self or others. Must provide safe, efficient, competent care to customer or patient population. Must demonstrate competency of the functions described in the performance continuum
  • Prepares cold food as assigned for patient line

There are several types of dietary aide, including:

Aide

Role:

Aides make it possible for patients to stay at home with less severe conditions, instead of staying in hospitals or retirement homes. They monitor the patients' condition, keep them company, and help practicing hygiene and with chores around the house. Aides perform basic health care as well and help with transportation, if necessary.

Home health aides are the fastest-growing occupation in the U.S., with an increase in demand of 70% from 2010 to 2020. This tendency is likely to continue in rapid growth up to 2030, as the Baby Boomer generation reaches seniority.

Aides make $18 per hour, on average, and generally work 40 hours a week, sometimes taking night shifts and working on weekends, too. Part-time and live-in arrangements are both common as well, so you have a lot of options to figure out what works best for you.

  • Average Salary: $27,793
  • Degree: Bachelor's Degree

Clinical Dietitian

Role:

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.

  • Average Salary: $59,133
  • Degree: Bachelor's Degree

Dietitian

Role:

Dieticians are specialists that help in planning food and nutrition programs and supervise the preparation and serving of meals. They usually run their service in hospitals and schools but sometimes can work with individuals. A dietician offers dietetic educational services, assesses patients' nutritional needs, and oversees meal planning. They also develop dietetic plans at the institutional level and work with individual clients to develop customized diets and meal plans for their overall healthcare. A dietician facilitates group sessions, collects data, and prepares statistical reports.

As a dietician, you need soft skills for you to work effectively with patients. Some of these skills include active listening skills since patients need complete attention when discussing their health issues. You will also need verbal communication skills as you will need excellent communication and speaking skills to convey information to the patients. You must also be able to instruct and persuade the patients, manage time well, and organize things with ease. Dieticians need at least a bachelor's degree in dietetics, food nutrition, or related areas like biochemistry, sociology, psychology. The median annual salary of a dietician is $59,410.

  • Average Salary: $58,480
  • Degree: Bachelor's Degree
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States With The Most Dietary Aide Jobs

Mouse over a state to see the number of active dietary aide jobs in each state. The darker areas on the map show where dietary aides earn the highest salaries across all 50 states.

Average Salary: Job Openings:

Number Of Dietary Aide Jobs By State

RankStateNumber of JobsAverage Salary
1Texas1,445$23,455
2New York1,346$32,008
3California1,146$32,692
4Pennsylvania1,055$27,285
5Michigan896$25,680
6Illinois892$24,646
7Indiana870$24,957
8Florida866$23,900
9Ohio762$26,095
10North Carolina762$24,935
11Georgia746$20,721
12New Jersey735$31,061
13Massachusetts583$31,107
14Minnesota567$30,298
15Wisconsin485$25,448
16Tennessee464$19,893
17Virginia452$23,999
18Maryland410$21,587
19Kansas390$24,664
20Washington386$36,793
21Missouri380$24,431
22Iowa356$24,009
23Kentucky352$26,404
24South Carolina308$24,602
25Colorado286$30,080
26Arizona277$27,439
27Oregon252$36,454
28Alabama245$22,342
29Nebraska214$26,511
30Oklahoma201$21,981
31West Virginia180$26,349
32Connecticut170$29,997
33Mississippi157$23,190
34Louisiana154$20,360
35Montana150$28,865
36New Mexico149$25,188
37Utah137$28,640
38Maine135$32,884
39New Hampshire118$29,957
40Arkansas113$23,319
41Idaho101$27,308
42Rhode Island84$31,188
43Alaska80$25,623
44Nevada79$29,324
45South Dakota75$27,166
46Delaware71$27,098
47North Dakota65$29,365
48Vermont55$29,466
49Hawaii51$29,149
50Wyoming33$32,222

Dietary Aide Education

Dietary Aide Majors

Business
14.3 %
General Studies
12.6 %
Nursing
9.3 %

Dietary Aide Degrees

High School Diploma

49.8 %

Bachelors

15.9 %

Associate

15.4 %

Top Skills For a Dietary Aide

The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 15.1% of dietary aides listed patients on their resume, but soft skills such as communication skills and customer-service skills are important as well.

Choose From 10+ Customizable Dietary Aide Resume templates

Zippia allows you to choose from different easy-to-use Dietary Aide templates, and provides you with expert advice. Using the templates, you can rest assured that the structure and format of your Dietary Aide resume is top notch. Choose a template with the colors, fonts & text sizes that are appropriate for your industry.

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Dietary Aide diversity

Dietary Aide Gender Distribution

Female
Female
72%
Male
Male
28%

After extensive research and analysis, Zippia's data science team found that:

  • Among dietary aides, 71.8% of them are women, while 28.2% are men.

  • The most common race/ethnicity among dietary aides is White, which makes up 62.1% of all dietary aides.

  • The most common foreign language among dietary aides is Spanish at 70.9%.

Online Courses For Dietary Aide That You May Like

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1. Rebuilding Our Relationship with Food

coursera

Have you ever made a conscious effort to change the way you eat (for health or other reasons) and then felt frustrated when your plans were derailed? You’re not alone. The best laid plans are often sabotaged by a food environment that makes it increasingly hard to make healthier food choices. This can leave many people feeling mistrustful of food or feeling that our relationship with food is somehow broken. In this course, we’ll explore the history of our changing food environment, the science...

2. Introduction to Food and Our Environment

coursera

This course is designed to help learners around the world become more sustainable eaters. Course videos can be watched in any order. Feel free to explore special areas of interest by skipping ahead and coming back to less familiar topics at a later stage. Together, we’ll explore key topics, like how food production impacts the environment and why meat production and protein consumption are often at the center of the debate around sustainability. We’ll introduce the pros and cons of different...

3. Fun food safety and sanitation course

udemy
4.5
(411)

The food safety course will help prepare you for safely working in a kitchen and food handler tests like Servesafe...

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Best States For a Dietary Aide

Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a dietary aide. The best states for people in this position are Washington, Oregon, Maine, and California. Dietary aides make the most in Washington with an average salary of $36,793. Whereas in Oregon and Maine, they would average $36,454 and $32,884, respectively. While dietary aides would only make an average of $32,692 in California, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.

1. Maine

Total Dietary Aide Jobs: 135
Highest 10% Earn:
$39,000
Location Quotient:
1.43

$32,884

Avg. Salary

View 135 Dietary Aide Jobs In ME

2. New York

Total Dietary Aide Jobs: 1,346
Highest 10% Earn:
$40,000
Location Quotient:
1.47

$32,008

Avg. Salary

View 1,346 Dietary Aide Jobs In NY

3. Oregon

Total Dietary Aide Jobs: 252
Highest 10% Earn:
$46,000
Location Quotient:
0.85

$36,454

Avg. Salary

View 252 Dietary Aide Jobs In OR
Full List Of Best States For Dietary Aides

How Do Dietary Aides Rate Their Jobs?

3/5

5 Stars

4 Stars

3 Stars

2 Stars

1 Star

Dietary Aide Reviews

3.0
Jan 2020
Pros

It’s an honest day’s work. Lots of lifting and walking around. Pots and pans to scrub, pantries to organize. You won’t be bored for a second, there’s always something to do.

Cons

At the end of the day, you’re body is so tired. From doing this much heavy work you’d expect a decent pay check. You won’t make enough to rent an apartment with this job.

Working as a Dietary Aide? Share your experience anonymously.
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Top Dietary Aide Employers

Most Common Employers For Dietary Aide

RankCompanyAverage SalaryHourly RateJob Openings
1Compass Group USA$29,961$14.40102
2Life Care Centers of America$29,094$13.99181
3Aramark$28,969$13.93139
4Healthcare Services Group$28,506$13.70352
5Kindred Healthcare$28,349$13.63259
6Life Care Solutions$28,199$13.56162
7St Joseph's Hospital$27,982$13.45101
8Unidine$27,893$13.41129
9Good Samaritan Center$27,344$13.15126
10American House Senior Living Communities$27,269$13.11181
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Dietary Aide Videos

DITL - Amy, a Dietary Aide
Dietary Aide III Job Preview
Job position, Dietary Aide Full time or part time at CCEC

Becoming a Dietary Aide FAQs

Do Dietary Aides Have To Cook?

No, dietary aides don't have to cook. Dietary aides are workers with food and nutrition knowledge who help others make food and health-related decisions. They often work in hospitals, nursing homes, and local and state governments.

How Long Does It Take To Be A Dietary Aide?

It takes less than one year to be a dietary aide since you can get a job right out of high school. Dietary aides provide food and nutrition-related advice to individuals in hospitals, nursing homes, and local and state governments.

Is A Dietary Aide Job Hard?

No, a dietary aide job is not very hard. Though, the pay is also not very good.

Dietary aides provide food and nutrition-related health advice to individuals in hospitals, nursing homes, and local and state governments. The work requires minimal food and nutrition knowledge and does not require a degree.

What Does A Dietary Aide Wear?

A dietary aide wears medical scrubs. Scrubs provide ease of movement for dietary aides when working with their patients. Many dietary aides work in hospitals or other medical facilities where scrubs are worn by several medical professionals.

Have more questions? See all answers to common healthcare practitioner and technical questions.

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Updated April 6, 2023