Senior therapist vs therapist

The differences between senior therapists and therapists can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. Additionally, a senior therapist has an average salary of $63,963, which is higher than the $55,943 average annual salary of a therapist.

The top three skills for a senior therapist include social work, autism and mental health. The most important skills for a therapist are social work, patients, and group therapy sessions.

Senior therapist vs therapist overview

	Senior Therapist	Therapist
Yearly salary	$63,963	$55,943
Hourly rate	$30.75	$26.90
Growth rate	14%	17%
Number of jobs	68,064	159,770
Job satisfaction	-	5
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 53%	Bachelor's Degree, 47%
Average age	41	41
Years of experience	4	-

What does a senior therapist do?

Senior therapists lead and manage a facility's therapeutic program and work hand-in-hand with other facility team members to deliver, oversee, plan, and coordinate the therapeutic program. These professionals promote professional accountability, quality development, evaluation, clinical governance, and monitoring. Besides supervising community forums and similar activities, senior therapists also attend appropriate staff and clinical supervision meetings. They document and share with the clinical team the right therapeutic guidelines and processes to follow.

What does a therapist do?

A therapist is responsible for improving the patients' health conditions by evaluating their needs and providing physical and mental support. Therapists are licensed, medical professionals who specialize in different areas to perform treatments and bring relief to patients. Some of their duties include diagnosing patient's problems, performing counseling services, monitoring medication progress, customizing therapy activities for pain management, and consulting other health professionals as needed. Therapists must have extensive knowledge with the medical industry to detect patients' conditions easily and provide effective medications.

Senior therapist vs therapist salary

Senior therapists and therapists have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Senior Therapist	Therapist
Average salary	$63,963	$55,943
Salary range	Between $44,000 And $91,000	Between $39,000 And $80,000
Highest paying City	New York, NY	San Francisco, CA
Highest paying state	Pennsylvania	California
Best paying company	Montage Health	Childhelp
Best paying industry	Energy	Government

Differences between senior therapist and therapist education

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

	Senior Therapist	Therapist
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 53%	Bachelor's Degree, 47%
Most common major	Psychology	Psychology
Most common college	California State University - Long Beach	California State University - Long Beach

Senior therapist vs therapist demographics

Here are the differences between senior therapists' and therapists' demographics:

	Senior Therapist	Therapist
Average age	41	41
Gender ratio	Male, 26.0% Female, 74.0%	Male, 24.4% Female, 75.6%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 7.0% Unknown, 5.5% Hispanic or Latino, 13.9% Asian, 4.6% White, 68.5% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.5%	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	6%	12%

Differences between senior therapist and therapist duties and responsibilities

Senior therapist example responsibilities.

Manage and target behaviors using the ESDM, ABA, PRT and SCERTS model.
Function as a case manager, co-le group therapy and provide psychiatrist supervise individual therapy to adolescent patients.
Work with children, adolescents, adults, couples and families.
Produce detailed quarterly reports on each student, used in IEP meetings to assess student's progress.
Collaborate with parents, teachers, and other professionals on the implementation of programs, and attend IEP meetings.
Implement one on one behavioral intervention programs in the homes of children with autism while using apply behavioral analysis therapy.

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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.

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Senior therapist vs therapist skills

Common senior therapist skills

Social Work, 12%
Autism, 9%
Mental Health, 8%
Patients, 8%
Behavior Analysis, 7%
ABA, 5%

Common therapist skills

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

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Updated January 8, 2025

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