Where will your career in psychology take you?
Severe and permanent disabilities can be crippling to a person's career and daily life. Vocational rehabilitation counselors are specifically trained to help people with such disabilities cope with these disabilities by helping them find jobs and live on their own. These disabilities can be wide-ranging and can include physical, mental and emotional disabilities. They can also include severe mental illnesses and substance abuse issues. They work with these patients to help them learn to live more active lives and, more importantly, secure gainful employment.
Neurology is the study of nervous system disorders and thus a neurologist is a doctor trained to study, diagnose and treat disorders relating to the nervous system. In many ways, a neurologist is similar to a psychiatrist. Neurological disorders can include everything from alcoholism to brain tumors and even disorders such as dementia and Lyme disease. These disorders affect the central nervous systems and neurologists go through years of training and schooling to not just identify these disorders but also develop treatment plans to cure or cope with these disorders. Many are trained specifically in one area of neurology and almost all are required to go through postdoctoral training even after medical school.
Also commonly referred to as speech therapists, speech pathologists specialize in diagnosing and treating communication and voice issues. But this treatment is not just for patients with stuttering or pronunciation issues. Speech pathologists do help with those types of issues but they also aide patients with issues that range from communicating ideas socially to sentence structure issues and physical voice issues as well. They can even help treat with brain function and cognitive problems, specifically if they affect a patient's voice, communication, or swallowing.
A special division within nursing, psychiatric nursing is specifically about assessing and treating mental health issues within patients or a group of patients. Most psychiatric nurses have master's or doctoral degrees in the field as this is an advanced profession within nursing and requires a more detailed and specialized training and understanding. These nurses usually deal with psychiatric disorders and treat these disorders with specific psychotherapy. They are commonly employed in hospitals and specialty clinics, but many are in private practice as well.
Most think of guidance counselors in the school setting and it is true, most guidance counselors work in schools. But on a more general level, guidance counselors are not just solely responsible with helping students make wise educational and career choices. They can also provide young adults with career advice and help students of all ages adjust socially to the school environment to fulfill their potential in the classroom. They can be found in primary and secondary schools and even in post-secondary institutions as well but many can also be found working career centers and job-placement organizations too.
Licensed professional counselors provide a variety of different kinds of care to patients. LPCs are trained to provide mental, emotional and even physical care for patients suffering from everything from abuse, addiction and even depression. They can work with individuals, couples, or families and really can identify and treat a large swath of issues. Licensed professional counselors are some of the most common mental health professionals in the workplace. They can be employed everywhere from hospitals and community health organizations to elder care facilities and rehab clinics.