$138,760top of the range nationally · middle $100,040 / yr
AI augments this role
Genetic Counselors in the United States earn a median of $100,040 a year. Pay starts near $78,270. Pay reaches $138,760 at the top of the range nationally. No single state has enough people in this job for a state figure to be meaningful.
Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 (Genetic Counselors, SOC 29-9092). Last checked 9 September 2026.
Entry level
$78,270
Top of the range · nationally
$138,760
Education
Master's degree in Genetic Counseling
Wages — U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 (Genetic Counselors). Top of the range is the national figure; no single state has enough people in this job to quote one. AI-impact rating is PayCrunch's editorial assessment. Updated September 2026.
🆕 New & Trending AI Tools for Genetic CounselorReviewed September 2026
We track new AI-tool launches every week and refresh this list — here’s what’s gaining traction for Genetic Counselor work right now.
INHERETNEWPaid / see site
Structured family-history and guideline-based hereditary-risk platform used before the visit.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: route intake so NCCN-style risk models run before you sit down — your time goes to counseling, not data entry
Franklin by GenooxNEWPaid / see site
Variant-interpretation platform that aggregates frequency, predictions, and literature.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: gather evidence on a variant, then apply ACMG/AMP yourself — the tool does not own the classification
OpenEvidenceNEWFree for verified clinicians
AI that answers clinical questions from current medical evidence, with citations.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: check a guideline or evidence point in general terms before you write a patient letter
NotebookLMNEWFree / $7.99 mo
Google tool that answers questions grounded only in the documents you give it — with citations.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: load a public guideline or your own de-identified template and keep wording on that source
CancerIQPaid / see site
Clinic platform that collects family history and runs hereditary-cancer risk models.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: pre-screen a de-identified pedigree against guidelines, then counsel from the output you verified
ChatGPTFree / $20 mo
AI assistant for de-identified education copy and letter scaffolds.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: draft a general explainer or letter scaffold — never paste pedigrees, names, or identifiable results into an open tool
ClaudeFree / $20 mo
AI assistant known for careful writing, long-document analysis, and coding.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: analyze big reports or spreadsheets and turn messy notes into clean, finished writing
Google GeminiFree / $20 mo
Google's AI assistant, built into Gmail, Docs, and Search.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: draft and reply inside Google Workspace and research without leaving the page
Microsoft CopilotFree / $30 mo
AI built into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams.
How a Genetic Counselor uses it: write documents, build spreadsheets, and summarize meetings inside Office
The room where inheritance becomes ordinary language
A genetic counselor spends the working day helping families understand how a condition can run through relatives. The setting might be a prenatal clinic, a cancer program, a pediatric genetics visit, a cardiology partnership, or a laboratory service that still ends in a conversation with a real person. You sit down with a patient, often with a partner or a parent, after a physician has already named a worry. Your task is to explain inheritance in words that person can repeat later at a kitchen table. You listen for who in the family has been affected, you sketch the family in the chart, and you slow the visit when fear is moving faster than the facts.
The explanation stays tied to the decision in front of the family. A pregnancy, a cancer history, a child with a new diagnosis, or a relative who wants to know what a result means for their own life each needs a different pace. You match the science to that decision. You leave room for values that are not yours to set: whether to pursue testing, whom to tell, and how much uncertainty a person can live with. The skill is translation. A textbook paragraph that happens to be accurate can still fail the visit if the family cannot use it.
Around that conversation sit other people who need your work. The physician wants a note that shows what was explained and what the family decided. A nurse needs to know whether the next appointment should stay on the books. A laboratory report may arrive in technical language, and your job is to talk about what it means for this family in plain speech. Stay with that conversation. The profession's daily craft is counseling and explanation, not a private lesson in how to read a laboratory printout. Families should leave with a summary they can use, a sense of what is known, and a clear picture of what remains uncertain.
The week is a mix of new visits and follow-ups. New visits take the longer block because the family story has to be built from scratch. Follow-ups are shorter and often harder, because a result has landed and the emotions have had time to settle into specific fears. Between visits you document, you return calls, you prepare for the next chart, and you answer the physician who wants a quick read on whether a referral belongs in your clinic. Telehealth fills part of many schedules. The screen changes the room. It does not change the duty to explain inheritance clearly and to write a note the next clinician can trust.
A master's degree, then the board
The path employers recognize is a master's degree in genetic counseling. Programs combine coursework in genetics and in counseling with supervised rotations in clinics like the ones above. That combination is the point. Science alone does not teach you how to sit with a crying parent. Counseling coursework alone does not teach you how inheritance works well enough to explain it without drifting into error. The degree is the preparation for both halves of the job. A bachelor's degree in biology or a related field is the common step before the master's. It helps you get into a program. The credential clinics hire for is the graduate degree.
Board certification is granted by the American Board of Genetic Counseling. The certificate shows that you completed the education the profession recognizes and that you met the board's requirement for certification. You prepare by finishing the master's program and then following the certification process the board itself describes. The public home for that credential is the American Board of Genetic Counseling. Read the board's own account of the certificate when you are getting ready. Exam mechanics belong to the board, and they are easy to garble, so this career guide stays with what the credential is, who grants it, and what it proves.
Certification and a start date are related, and they are not the same event. Some hospitals hire a new graduate who holds the master's and who has a dated plan to complete certification. Others want the certificate in hand before the first solo clinic. Ask which version the posting means. Either way, the thing you are proving is narrow and serious: you can explain inheritance, you can support a decision, and you trained in a way the board is willing to stand behind. A short course, a certificate from an unrelated school, or a strong undergraduate record does not substitute for that pair of the master's and the board credential.
Certificate and licence do different work
The American Board of Genetic Counseling grants the professional certificate. Where a state requires a licence, that state grants permission to practice there. Carry both facts into any offer conversation.
The state licence, where one is required
Some states require a licence before you practice as a genetic counselor. Where that rule exists, the state grants the licence. The licence is legal permission to practice in that state. It proves the state has accepted you under its rules. It is separate from board certification, which is the profession's national credential. You prepare by meeting the state's rules, which commonly rest on the master's degree and the board certificate, and by applying to the agency that regulates the practice. Look up the state where the patients will sit, including patients you will see by video if that state treats the visit as practice inside its borders.
If your state does not licence the title, the master's and the board certificate still do the work of showing an employer you are trained. Silence in one state says nothing about the next state over. When you compare two offers, put licence status beside the salary. A higher number in a state that will not let you start until a licence arrives can be the slower offer. Ask who files the application, whether the employer supports the cost, and what happens to the start date if the licence is still pending. Those answers belong in the offer, not in a hallway comment after you have given notice at your current clinic.
Who actually offers the first clinic seat
Hospitals, academic medical centers, children's hospitals, cancer centers, prenatal practices, laboratory genetic-counseling services, and some public health programs hire counselors. The first job is usually a defined clinic rather than a free-floating role. Cancer, prenatal, and pediatrics are the common doors. Tell the truth about which rotation felt like your best work. A cancer program would rather hire a counselor who is honest about a prenatal lean, and then place that person in prenatal work, than hire someone who claims every specialty feels identical.
In the interview, expect a case conversation rather than a trivia drill. A prenatal history, a cancer family, or a pediatric diagnosis gives the manager something to hear. They are listening for how you explain inheritance, how you leave room for the family's values, and how you would document the visit. Bring a writing sample if they ask, with names and identifying detail removed. References from clinical supervisors matter more than a long list of campus roles. Courtesy to the front desk and to the nurses during a shadow day is part of the evaluation, because those are the people who will protect your schedule or quietly stop sending you patients.
Apply with dates. Say when the master's conferred or will confer, where certification stands, and whether a state licence is required for the posting you want. If a partner's job, a visa, or a city limit is real, say it before the manager builds a fall clinic around you. Small services cannot absorb a late reversal. A clear constraint is easier to plan around than charm that dissolves after the offer letter.
From a supervised panel to the person others call
You start with a panel and a supervisor nearby. The first months are about one clinic's rhythm: which physicians refer, how a new visit is supposed to run, and how the note has to read for that service. You learn the local phrases families already use, and you learn which explanations land. After you are steady, the path opens. You may take a student, cover a second clinic, or become the counselor who builds the referral path with a cancer center or a maternal-fetal medicine group. Some people move into laboratory roles, where the day is more about helping clinicians and patients understand reports. Others move toward program leadership, teaching, or public health.
A lead counselor still has to be good at the visit. The extra work is scheduling the team, keeping the documentation habit, and representing the service in hospital meetings. An academic track adds teaching and a project your division can name. A laboratory track trades some of the long clinic visits for a higher volume of shorter explanations tied to reports. None of these forks replace the core skill. When you choose, ask how much of the week remains direct counseling. A title can drift into meetings and leave the skill you trained for unused, and that drift is a real career risk in a small department that keeps adding committees.
Moving cities is common because the jobs cluster in larger medical centers. Before you move, line up the licence if the new state requires one, and ask whether your board certificate is already the credential they recognize. Ask who covers clinic when you are teaching or when you are in a leadership meeting. A beautiful title with no backup counselor means you will do both jobs. Ask how students are assigned if you enjoy teaching, and ask whether teaching time is protected or simply added on top of a full panel. Those answers predict the week better than the job title on the posting.
National figures only, including the high end
The pay figures here are Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for May 2025, for Genetic Counselors. The series matches this occupation. Entry pay is $78,270. The national median is $100,040. The gap from entry to the median is $21,770. The national high end of the published range is $138,760. The gap from the median to that national high end is $38,720. Call $138,760 the national high end of the published range. No state name belongs on that figure. These facts also include no list of state medians, so there is nothing honest to quote about typical pay in a particular state. Leave other occupations' state tables alone.
Treat the three national numbers as three different facts. $78,270 is the entry figure, the low end of the published picture. $100,040 is the national median, the middle. $138,760 is the national high end of the published range, the far edge of what the Bureau published, not a typical offer and not a stand-in for a state median. A recruiter who opens with the high end is talking about the top of the published range. A recruiter who opens with the median is talking about the middle. Ask which number they mean before you decide whether the offer is ordinary.
The shape of the range matters for how you talk. The step from entry up to the median is $21,770. The further step from the median to the national high end is $38,720, a larger stretch. Early-career movement is the first gap. Later movement, into scarce roles, is the second gap. Neither gap is a promise that your employer will pay it. Both gaps are a way to see whether an offer is hugging the bottom, sitting near the middle, or already reaching toward the national high end of the published range.
Sitting down with an offer letter
Put the base salary next to $100,040 and next to $78,270 before you answer. If you are a new graduate, the $21,770 gap between entry and the median is the distance you can discuss as certification, a full panel, and a second clinic skill arrive. If you already hold board certification, and a state licence where one is required, you have a reason to start the talk at the median and to move upward only when the role matches scarce skill. A lead job, a hard-to-staff specialty, or a service that has failed to hire for a long time can support a conversation toward the national high end of $138,760. The $38,720 gap from the median to that high end is the room at the top of the published range, and it shows up only when the role supports it.
Ask what sits beside the base. Clinic support, protected time for notes, student-teaching duties, continuing education support, and a written path to a lead title change the job as much as a few thousand dollars. If the state requires a licence you do not yet hold, get the plan in writing: who files, what support the employer gives, and what happens to pay and to the start date while you wait. Then come back to the published figures so the conversation stays tied to something both of you can look up. You can say the national median is $100,040 and the national high end of the published range is $138,760 without inventing a private survey.
Before you accept, write four lines for yourself. The base they offered. The national median of $100,040. Whether the offer is closer to entry at $78,270 or to the national high end at $138,760. And whether certification and any required licence are finished or dated. If the base sits near entry while the job expects you to run a clinic alone, the entry-to-median gap of $21,770 is the sentence you need. If the base already sits near the national high end, shift the talk to the work: panel size, how many specialties you cover, and who backs you up when you are out. The master's degree, the board certificate, the state licence where it is required, and these three published numbers are enough to keep the conversation adult.
The top of Genetic Counselor pay — and how to get there with AI
National top-of-range annual wage for Genetic Counselors. No single state has enough people in this job to quote a state figure. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025.
And the role it leads to — Pediatricians, General — reaches $408,620 in Arizona.
$78,270entry$100,040middle$138,760top end
Counselors sitting in the middle of this range are booked by whoever the clinic schedules them for; the ones at the top brought the referral stream with them and decide which test gets ordered and whether it will be covered.
Look at the duties that touch money in this job. Interviewing patients and reviewing records to build a family history determines whether testing is indicated. Interpreting laboratory results and communicating them to physicians determines whether the referring doctor sends the next patient. Writing detailed consultation reports that explain complex genetic concepts to a referring physician is, in practice, marketing to that physician. A counselor who drafts the structured half of those reports and then rewrites every clinical statement can see more families a week without thinning the counseling, and can spend the recovered time on the cardiology, oncology and obstetric practices that decide where referrals go.
Your playbook, by where you are now
Just startingMake the report the referrer's favourite document
Build a consultation report skeleton that answers what the referring physician needs first: indication, pedigree finding, test recommended, and what changes in management if it is positive.
Draft the background and inheritance-explanation sections with Claude from your own intake notes, then rewrite every risk statement and every result interpretation yourself.
Keep pedigrees in dedicated pedigree drawing and management software rather than redrawing families by hand each visit.
Learn one risk model such as BRCAPRO properly, including where its assumptions stop holding for the families you actually see.
Ask the two physicians who refer to you most what they wish your reports said, and change the template accordingly.
What proves it: A report format referring physicians start requesting by name.
Realistic span: the first two years in practice
A few years inTake responsibility for the ordering decisions
Own test selection for a clinical area — obstetrics, oncology, cardiovascular or neurology — including which panel, which lab and what the prior authorisation will need.
Track your own denials and appeals in a FileMaker Pro or Microsoft Access database, because nobody else is looking at why testing does not get paid for.
Prepare the genetics education material the referring clinic hands out, so patients arrive already understanding what a carrier result means.
Use NotebookLM to hold the current literature on a condition you see often, then read the primary papers before you change a single counselling point.
Run one session a quarter for the referring practice's clinicians on what they should be referring and when.
What proves it: A referral area where you set the testing pathway and the approval rate improved.
Realistic span: years three through six
ExperiencedBe the reason the service exists
Build the business case for the service using your own volume, coverage and turnaround figures, and present it to whoever funds the clinic.
Set the standard for how results are returned across the group, so a difficult positive is delivered the same way whoever is on that day.
Take on industry, laboratory or telehealth work alongside clinic time, since those buyers pay for exactly the interpretive judgment you have.
Supervise new counselors and hold the report and pedigree standards you wrote.
Keep reading the literature and going to the meetings, because in this field an out-of-date counsellor is quietly stopped being referred to.
What proves it: A funded service line, or a laboratory-facing role, that traces back to referral volume you generated.
Realistic span: seven years and beyond
The next 90 days
Spend the next ninety days rebuilding one document: the consultation report you send back to referring physicians. Pull your last twenty and mark every sentence a busy clinician would skip. Then restructure it so the recommendation and the management change sit in the first paragraph, the pedigree finding is legible, and the inheritance explanation the patient also needs sits at the end where it does not bury the clinical point. Use an assistant for the boilerplate half and your own hand for every interpretation. Send the new version to your three highest-volume referrers with a note asking whether it is more useful. That conversation is how a genetic counselor stops being a slot on a schedule and starts being the reason a referral pattern exists.
Wage figures: BLS OEWS, May 2025. The playbook is PayCrunch editorial guidance, not a guarantee of pay or placement.
Every figure is the national median from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (OEWS) shown on that role’s own page.
Never used AI before? Start here (2 minutes).
Start with a structured risk-assessment tool. Platforms like INHERET or CancerIQ collect and structure family history and run guideline-based (e.g., NCCN) risk models before you ever sit down, so your visit starts with the analysis done and your time goes to counseling. If your clinic has one, route intakes through it.
For variant and evidence work, learn Franklin by Genoox and public resources like ClinVar and VarSome; for general education and drafting patient letters, use ChatGPT or OpenEvidence in general terms only. Keep every pedigree and result inside your BAA-covered clinical systems.
The one rule, forever: Genetic information is uniquely sensitive and protected (HIPAA and GINA) -- never paste patient names, pedigrees, or identifiable results into a consumer AI tool; use only your BAA-covered clinical systems. AI can pre-screen risk or summarize a variant, but every classification and recommendation is your clinical responsibility: verify against curated databases (ClinVar, ACMG/AMP criteria) and current guidelines, and deliver results through counseling, never as an automated readout.
The plays — exact steps, exact prompts
Do these in order. Each one is copy-paste ready. You do not need to know anything about AI going in.
1
Automate family-history and risk assessment
Why this pays: Structured pre-visit risk assessment lets you see more patients and spend your scarce clinical time on counseling, not data entry. Higher throughput and guideline-concordant triage are exactly what expand a counselor's value and pay, especially in productivity-based or telehealth roles.
INHERETCancerIQProgeny / PhenoTips
1
Route intakes through INHERET or CancerIQ so patients enter their family history ahead of time and the tool runs guideline-based risk models (NCCN, Tyrer-Cuzick) and flags who meets testing criteria.
2
Use the structured output to prep an efficient session.
Copy-paste this prompt
Given this de-identified risk-assessment summary [paste pedigree structure without names: relationships, ages, cancer types and ages of onset, prior testing], outline the key points I should cover in a [hereditary breast/ovarian cancer] counseling session: which criteria are met, what testing is appropriate to discuss, the main risk and benefit points for this pattern, and questions I should ask to fill gaps. General clinical prep -- I confirm against guidelines.
De-identified only -- no names or record numbers. You verify criteria against current NCCN/ACMG guidance and own the recommendation.
3
Build pedigrees efficiently in Progeny or PhenoTips and keep the structured data for accurate documentation.
What you'll haveMore patients seen with better-prepared, guideline-concordant sessions -- the throughput and triage quality that lift a counselor's pay.
2
Accelerate variant interpretation
Why this pays: Variant interpretation skill is what qualifies counselors for the higher-paying lab and industry roles. Using AI-assisted platforms to work variants faster (while applying ACMG rigor) builds exactly the competency those roles pay for.
Franklin by GenooxVarSomeClinVar
1
Work variants in Franklin by Genoox or VarSome, which aggregate population frequency, in-silico predictions, and literature -- then apply the ACMG/AMP criteria yourself and cross-check ClinVar for existing classifications and conflicts.
2
Structure your evidence review with a prompt.
Copy-paste this prompt
Help me organize an ACMG/AMP evidence review for a variant [gene, cDNA/protein change -- no patient identifiers]. List the evidence categories I should populate (population data, computational, functional, segregation, de novo, etc.), what would raise vs. lower the classification, the common pitfalls in applying each criterion, and where I must check primary literature rather than trust an aggregator. Educational framework only.
AI organizes the framework; you make the classification per ACMG/AMP against primary evidence. Aggregators and predictors can be wrong -- verify.
3
Keep a personal log of variants you've worked; documented curation experience is your ticket into lab and industry roles.
What you'll haveFaster, rigorous variant work and a growing curation portfolio -- the skill set behind the higher-paid lab and industry positions.
3
Scale counseling through telehealth
Why this pays: Telehealth genetic counseling (clinical and industry-sponsored) is a fast-growing, often premium-paying segment. AI-assisted prep and documentation make virtual visits efficient enough to carry a full, geography-independent caseload.
Genome Medical / GeneMattersINHERETChatGPT
1
Take telehealth caseloads through platforms like Genome Medical or GeneMatters, using pre-visit structured intake (e.g., INHERET) so each virtual visit starts ready.
2
Draft clear patient-facing summaries and letters after visits.
Copy-paste this prompt
Draft a plain-language post-visit summary letter for a patient after [negative hereditary cancer panel] genetic counseling: what the result means and doesn't mean, what it changes about screening (in general terms), the importance of updating family history over time, and when to follow up. Warm, clear, 8th-grade reading level. General template with placeholders -- no patient identifiers.
Template only; insert specifics inside your secure EHR. Results are delivered through counseling -- the letter supports, not replaces, that conversation.
What you'll haveA full telehealth caseload run efficiently -- the reach and utilization that push earnings toward the $138,760 top of the range.
4
Move into a lab or industry role
Why this pays: The clearest jump above clinical pay is into diagnostic labs, biotech, or pharma (variant curation, medical science liaison, product, medical affairs). AI both builds the skills those roles want and helps you position for them.
ChatGPTPerplexityLinkedIn
1
Research target companies and roles.
Copy-paste this prompt
I'm a genetic counselor with [X years, cancer specialty] wanting to move into industry. Explain the main non-clinical career paths for GCs (lab variant scientist, medical science liaison, clinical product, medical affairs), what each pays relative to clinical, the skills and experience each wants, and how to reframe my clinical experience for these roles. Then list the types of companies hiring.
General career research -- verify specifics with people in those roles. Keep any work examples fully de-identified.
2
Use AI to tailor your resume and LinkedIn to industry language and to prep for case-style interviews (variant classification, communication scenarios).
What you'll haveA credible pivot into higher-paying lab/industry roles -- the single biggest income step available to a genetic counselor.
5
Sharpen counseling and patient education
Why this pays: Excellent, clear counseling drives outcomes, referrals, and reputation. AI helps you prepare tailored explanations and materials for complex or emotionally hard conversations, raising the quality and volume you can sustain.
ChatGPTOpenEvidenceNotebookLM
1
Prepare a clear explanation for a difficult concept.
Copy-paste this prompt
Help me explain [a variant of uncertain significance (VUS)] to an anxious patient in plain, reassuring language: what a VUS is, why we don't change medical management based on it, how reclassification over time works, and what they should and shouldn't do with this information. Warm and clear, no jargon, 2-3 short paragraphs. General education, not a specific patient.
General scripts to prepare -- personalize to the individual and their emotional context. No patient details in the tool.
2
Use OpenEvidence to quickly ground yourself in current guidance on a condition before a session, and NotebookLM to keep study materials for specialties you're building.
What you'll haveClearer, faster-prepared counseling for hard conversations -- the quality and reputation that support advancement and top-band pay.
6
Streamline documentation and pre-authorization
Why this pays: Notes, letters, and insurance pre-authorizations for genetic testing eat clinical time and gate whether testing gets approved (and paid). AI-drafted documentation and medical-necessity letters speed both, protecting revenue and freeing your schedule.
ChatGPTClaudeclinic EHR
1
Draft a strong medical-necessity/pre-authorization letter fast.
Copy-paste this prompt
Draft a medical-necessity letter template to a payer requesting authorization for [hereditary cancer panel testing] for a patient meeting [NCCN] criteria. Include sections for the clinical and family-history rationale (placeholders), the specific guideline criteria met, the test requested, and how results will change management. Professional and evidence-referenced. Template with placeholders -- no patient identifiers.
Insert patient specifics only inside your secure EHR. You confirm criteria and clinical accuracy; payers and guidelines change.
2
Standardize your common note types and letters as AI-assisted templates so documentation stops eating your evenings.
What you'll haveFaster approvals and a lighter documentation load -- more approved testing and more clinical capacity, both supporting pay at the top of the range.
Your 12-month sequence to the top of the range
How the plays above stack into a path from median pay toward the $138,760 tier.
Month 1
Route intakes through a structured risk tool (INHERET/CancerIQ) and start prepping sessions from its output. Build note and letter templates.
Months 2-3
Build a rigorous, AI-assisted ACMG variant-interpretation workflow and start logging your curation experience.
Months 3-6
Add telehealth caseload capacity; standardize pre-authorization and patient-summary letters to protect revenue and time.
Months 6-12
Deepen a specialty and a variant portfolio; explore lab/industry roles and reframe your experience for them.
Year 2
Make the move that pays -- a lab/industry role, a lead clinical position, or a high-volume telehealth practice at the top of the band.
Gear for this job
As an Amazon Associate, PayCrunch earns from qualifying purchases. Links to books and tools are for the job on this page; we only recommend what we’d use in the work.
Wiley-Blackwell 3rd for ABGC CGC (page already has the CGC card). Not ABMGG. Not the 2nd edition.
Next steps for a Genetic Counselor
Some links below are affiliate or partner links. PayCrunch may earn a commission if you enroll or subscribe through them, at no extra cost to you. Wage figures on this page still come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, not from these programs.
Genetic Counselor work is specific enough that a stamped 'check out these courses' block would be noise. BLS files this work as Genetic Counselors (SOC 29-9092). O*NET Job Zone 5 is typical: graduate or professional school, so the honest next credential is a graduate-level or professional certificate — not a random catalog dump.
The occupation's listed knowledge areas include Biology and Psychology; the links search those subjects, not a generic 'career courses' list.
The next title this dataset points at is Pediatricians, General; a credential aimed that way is a clearer step than another year in the same seat.
Coursera search for counseling — a graduate-level or professional certificate that lines up with healthcare, not a generic professional-development aisle.
FlexJobs screens remote, hybrid, freelance, and flexible listings so you are not wading through unverified ads. This is a job-board search for Genetic Counselor work, not a claim that they list a counted SOC 29-9092 inventory.
Write a Genetic Counselor resume, or one aimed at Pediatricians, General, instead of a blank template. Resume Now is a resume builder; we are not claiming a counted template set for this SOC.
A Genetic Counselor resume that names the actual tasks on this page, or the step-up title Pediatricians, General, beats a blank template when you apply.
What Genetic Counselors earn by state
This page does not show a state table, and the reason is worth stating: the Bureau publishes this occupation nationally, but fewer than five states employ enough people in it to report a median we would stand behind. Scaling the national median by a cost-of-living index would produce a number for every state, but it would be an estimate of living costs wearing a wage’s clothes, and PayCrunch would rather show you nothing than that.
What the national figures say: pay starts near $78,270, the median is $100,040, and the top of the range is $138,760. Those national figures come from U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025.
No. The heart of the job is a nuanced, emotional conversation -- helping a family understand risk and make a values-based decision -- and AI can't hold it or take responsibility for the interpretation. AI does the family-history intake, risk pre-screening, and variant evidence-gathering, which lets you counsel more people and go deeper on hard cases. It expands the counselor's reach; it doesn't replace the counseling.
Is it safe to use ChatGPT in genetic counseling?
Only with zero identifying information. Genetic data is protected by HIPAA and GINA and is uniquely sensitive -- never paste names, pedigrees, or results into consumer tools. Keep all of that in your BAA-covered clinical systems, and use general AI only for education, templates, and evidence frameworks phrased without patient details.
How does AI raise a genetic counselor's pay?
The top of the pay band is in lab/industry roles, telehealth at scale, and specialized/lead positions. AI helps you build the variant-interpretation skills those roles want, see more patients through structured intake and telehealth, and handle documentation fast -- the throughput and skill growth that move you up and out of entry-level clinical pay.
Can I trust AI variant classifications?
No -- treat AI and aggregator outputs as a starting point, never a verdict. Predictors and even some database entries are wrong or conflicting. You apply the ACMG/AMP criteria against primary evidence, cross-check ClinVar, and own the classification. AI speeds the evidence-gathering; the interpretation is yours.
Which tool should a genetic counselor learn first?
A structured risk-assessment platform (INHERET or CancerIQ) if you're clinical, because it immediately expands how many patients you can see well. If you're aiming at lab/industry, prioritize variant-interpretation platforms (Franklin by Genoox, VarSome) and ClinVar/ACMG fluency. Add a general assistant for education and documentation.
Methodology & sources
Salary (median, 10th, top of the range) — U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, OEWS.
By state — the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ own state medians, limited to states employing at least 500 people in the occupation. No cost-of-living arithmetic is applied to a wage anywhere on this page.
The plays — PayCrunch's own step-by-step guidance using publicly available AI tools. Tool names/URLs are real and current as of August 2026; prompts written to work as-is. Verify any professional output before relying on it.