Grief counselor vs therapist

The differences between grief counselors and therapists can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. Additionally, a therapist has an average salary of $55,943, which is higher than the $39,859 average annual salary of a grief counselor.

The top three skills for a grief counselor include patients, MSW and community outreach. The most important skills for a therapist are social work, patients, and group therapy sessions.

Grief counselor vs therapist overview

	Grief Counselor	Therapist
Yearly salary	$39,859	$55,943
Hourly rate	$19.16	$26.90
Growth rate	-	17%
Number of jobs	27,537	159,770
Job satisfaction	-	5
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 54%	Bachelor's Degree, 47%
Average age	44	41
Years of experience	-	-

Grief counselor vs therapist salary

Grief counselors and therapists have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Grief Counselor	Therapist
Average salary	$39,859	$55,943
Salary range	Between $32,000 And $49,000	Between $39,000 And $80,000
Highest paying City	-	San Francisco, CA
Highest paying state	-	California
Best paying company	-	Childhelp
Best paying industry	-	Government

Differences between grief counselor and therapist education

There are a few differences between a grief counselor and a therapist in terms of educational background:

	Grief Counselor	Therapist
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 54%	Bachelor's Degree, 47%
Most common major	Psychology	Psychology
Most common college	University of Pennsylvania	California State University - Long Beach

Grief counselor vs therapist demographics

Here are the differences between grief counselors' and therapists' demographics:

	Grief Counselor	Therapist
Average age	44	41
Gender ratio	Male, 24.4% Female, 75.6%	Male, 24.4% Female, 75.6%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 15.6% Unknown, 5.1% Hispanic or Latino, 11.1% Asian, 3.5% White, 63.5% American Indian and Alaska Native, 1.2%	Black or African American, 4.0% Unknown, 3.8% Hispanic or Latino, 7.9% Asian, 11.3% White, 72.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.5%
LGBT Percentage	9%	12%

Differences between grief counselor and therapist duties and responsibilities

Grief counselor example responsibilities.

Provide individual grief counseling to hospice and non-hospice community patients in bereavement.
Provide anticipatory grief and bereavement counseling support to family members of hospice patients.
Work towards empowering juveniles and their families to support a positive lifestyle by providing strength base intensive intervention and rehabilitation services.
Organize and lead regular youth and college bible studies, teaching about prayer and promoting spirituality.

Therapist example responsibilities.

Manage ventilator and BiPAP's and create or update care plans per patient needs.
Demonstrate working knowledge of community mental health services identify in the Medicaid guidelines and attain contractual outcomes within designate time frames.
Provide on-call crisis intervention as well as standard treatment, rehabilitation and support services with some interventions requiring specialize therapy services.
Develop and implement an effective curriculum of DBT inform group and art therapy classes specifically tailor for chemically dependent patients.
Provide trauma-inform individual psychotherapy, TREM group treatment protocol, and EMDR.
Utilize current brain base therapeutic techniques to teach clients adaptive skills to utilize in daily lives.

Grief counselor vs therapist skills

Common grief counselor skills

Patients, 19%
MSW, 18%
Community Outreach, 11%
Emotional Support, 10%
Educational Workshops, 10%
Ministry, 7%

Common therapist skills

Social Work, 23%
Patients, 12%
Group Therapy Sessions, 8%
Crisis Intervention, 7%
Mental Health, 4%
Patient Care, 3%