3 Important Requirements To Be An Addiction Counselor

Helping change the lives of people is not an easy job especially with those who are addicted to drugs. Substance abuse is one of the biggest social problems in the world today. Children as young as twelve years old may have had its first dose of illegal drugs. This is indeed alarming as people may have continuously overlooked the harmful effects of these drugs on the body because of the temporary high emotions that they feel.

But there are some professional individuals who are brave enough to do addiction counseling. Addiction counselors deal both with teens and seniors who are victims of substance abuse. They would have to listen to the stories of these people. Understand them without any prejudice and find effective solutions on how to overcome a drug problem. It is important that you go down to the cause of the problem and discuss the different methods on how to cope up with it.

What does an addiction counselor do?

Some of the important responsibilities of the addiction counselor are:

• meeting with patients and listening to their stories
• identifying the cause of their addiction
• creating a recovery plan for the patient
• encouraging them to join support groups
• creating aftercare plans

What are the requirements to become an addiction counselor?

If you are interested in being one of the addiction counselors, you first need to complete certain requirements for the job and let our healthcare staffing in Philadelphia, the ATC Healthcare Services, find a good job for you.

Here are three of the requirements that you must have:

• Education

  Education requirement for addiction counselor differs from agency to agency. There are some agencies that only require a high school diploma and a certificate while others require a bachelor’s degree. Although having a good educational background could be advantageous because they can work with less supervision, it would still require one to have a great knowledge and understanding on substance abuse so they can relate to the patient.

  It would also be advisable that counselors will have knowledge on mental health, human behavior and how substance abuse can affect our mental health.

• Training

  This is particularly essential to those who do not have a bachelor’s degree. The training would usually consist of how to respond to a crisis, how to deal with patients properly without offending them, how to protect your client’s privacy.

• Licensing

  Licensing can take various forms. You can take licensure exams because you want to engage in private practice for addiction counseling or you simply want to have a license as an addiction counselor. The tests may differ in each situation.

  Lastly, when you have your license already, it does not stop there. You have to attend seminars and training at least once a year in order to refresh your knowledge about your responsibilities and the right ethics that a counselor must exhibit.

If you wish to take the challenge of helping change the lives of the people, be one of our addiction counselors. Our health staffing agency will be the one to look for a vacant job for your or vice versa. We are the trusted health staffing agency in Philadelphia.

For queries, you can check ATC Healthcare Services in 8600 West Chester Pike, Suite #303 Upper Darby, PA 19082.