As an emergency room (ER) nurse, you’re adaptable, assertive, and adept at working in a fast-paced, bustling environment—and your resume should display that same level of expertise.

An effective ER nurse resume gives potential employers a quick overview of your educational and career accomplishments to showcase why you’d be a valuable asset to their team. It also highlights your skills and certifications to distinguish you from other applicants vying for the role.

Although you possess extraordinary skills as an ER nurse, such as the ability to deliver lifesaving treatment and keep a cool head in extremely pressing situations, writing an effective emergency room nurse resume presents its own unique challenges—ones that can be difficult for even the most seasoned of healthcare professionals.

To help you secure a rewarding job in the ER of your choice, we’re walking you through how to craft an emergency nurse resume that will stand out to recruiters and employers. 

How Should You Craft Your ER Nurse Resume?

A well-written and concise resume showcases that you’re competent and well-versed in the needs of your patients and your future employers. In other words, your resume should be tailored to the specific position you’re applying for. 

When applying for an ER nursing role, your resume should follow a standardized format so employers can quickly and clearly find key information about you.

Step 1: Create an Objective Statement

You should always start your resume with a personalized paragraph that introduces who you are and details your most relevant experience and skills. This statement should also include both your short- and long-term goals within the emergency department. Why?

This is where you’ll make your first impression to your future employer, so use it as an opportunity to stand out. Don’t be afraid to showcase your personality, your passion for helping others, and your drive to grow as a committed healthcare professional.

In addition to your statement, be sure to also include your:

  • Phone number
  • Email address
  • Current location

Consider ending your statement with one or two additional assets that will show the unique value you can bring to your future department and team. You might want to list accomplishments such as:

  • Certifications
  • Specialized care training
  • High-stress experiences

Step 2: Showcase Your Professional Experience

The second section of your nursing resume should showcase your clinical experience within the ER field. For each position, include the following:

  • Years of experience
  • Job responsibilities
  • Achievements

Including one key takeaway that you gained from each position is a savvy way to convey to employers your ongoing personal growth. If you have the space, consider mentioning how a previous job helped you gain confidence in triage assessment or taught you how to handle disaster scenarios with composure and diligence.

Step 3: Display Your Expertise 

Now comes the most fun part. This is where you get to showcase the advanced ER nurse skills that qualify you for the position. You’ll want to include any nursing skills that pertain directly to emergency responses, team communications, patient diagnoses, nursing care, and life support.

In addition to including any advanced life support certifications you’ve received, such as ACLS and PALS, you may also want to list your ability to:

  • Communicate effectively 
  • Perform CPR and advanced airway management
  • Manage and delegate tasks
  • Thrive in a high-stress environment
  • Treat and care for pediatric patients, if your experience is applicable
  • Lead teams as a charge nurse 
  • Handle emergency situations, such as code blue or disaster responses, and follow emergency protocols

If you’ve worked in ERs in the past, be sure to include the trauma levels you’re experienced in. While diagnosing and treating life-threatening injuries is part of every trauma nurse’s job, it’s important to specify levels as it tells employers the exact resources, expertise, and care capabilities you’re familiar with. 

The different levels of trauma are: 

  • Level I – Nurses with Level I trauma experience have the most robust skill sets for providing total care to their patients—from prevention to rehabilitation. Some of their skills may include conducting comprehensive assessments, educating patients, and involvement in quality assessment and improvement programs. Furthermore, their expertise is complemented by the 24-hour in-house coverage from general surgeons and access to specialized care across multiple disciplines that Level I trauma centers provide.
  • Level II – Level II trauma nurses typically excel in providing immediate treatment to stabilize patients before they are transferred to Level I trauma centers or other facilities for further specialized care. Their skills often revolve around initial assessment, stabilization, and preparation for transfer. Additionally, they may have a strong understanding of trauma protocols and be proficient in managing a variety of injuries with limited resources.
  • Level III – As a Level III trauma nurse, you likely provided assessment, resuscitation, surgery, intensive care, and stabilization when caring for injured patients. If you’ve worked to support rural and community hospitals—a common practice amongst Level III trauma centers—be sure to include that on your resume as well. 
  • Level IV – Level IV trauma nurses have advanced skill sets in administering Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS), as well as evaluation, stabilization, and diagnosis of patients with severe or life-threatening injuries. Patients are transferred to higher levels of care if needed to ensure optimal treatment and management.
  • Level V – Level V trauma centers play a crucial role in providing initial evaluation and stabilization before patients are transferred. Most often, Level V trauma nurses are positioned at rural healthcare facilities. While they can provide initial emergency care, patients are typically transferred to higher-level trauma centers to receive comprehensive care. Nurses with Level V trauma experience can list triage, wound management, and resuscitation. 

Step 4: Include Your Educational Background

The American Nurses Credentialing Center recommends including your educational background before detailing your specific certifications and licensures. This allows hiring managers to quickly identify if you’re a good fit for their team.

In this section, include your degree, university, years attended, and GPA, if applicable. 

Step 5: List Certifications, Programs, and Licenses

As an ER nurse, you’ve received state-specific licensure, earned various certifications, and pursued clinical training programs to specialize within your field. You’ll want to include these accomplishments on your nursing resume:

  • Licenses – List the license type, the licensing state or body, the license name or number, the nurse licensure compact, and then the expiration date. 
  • Certifications – Begin with the name of the certification, then include the conferring organization, the expiration date, and the certification number. 
  • Training programs – Include the name of the program, the administering body, and the date of completion. 

How Do You List ER Travel Nursing vs Permanent Nursing Employment On Your Resume?

If you have prior experience as a travel nurse within an emergency department, include your position in the work experience section of your resume. Under your position, briefly describe that this was a travel assignment, rather than a permanent role.

When describing the role, highlight the unique experiences you had as a travel nurse. Traveling gives you an entirely separate skill set versus staff nurses so, for this section, you may want to mention your: 

  • Adaptability and flexibility
  • Self-motivation
  • Eagerness to learn
  • Cross-cultural competence
  • Broad clinical experience
  • Strong interpersonal skills

How Can You Make Your ER Nurse Resume Stand Out?

When trying to distinguish your resume from your contemporaries in the field, you should consider the specific skills and capabilities you exercise in the ER. 

Maybe you’re a travel nurse with a history of high-quality care in various clinical settings. Or, perhaps you’re a seasoned staff nurse with an encyclopedic knowledge of emergency responses and protocols.  

Whatever your history and skill set, you can create a distinguished resume by including:

  • Locale specifics – Emergency roles are found in a variety of settings, including urban and rural areas, as well as teaching hospitals, standalone trauma centers, and disaster environments. Your specific locational experience can greatly bolster your resume, particularly if you utilize certain skill sets. For example, hospitals provide ER nurses with the opportunity to learn a large variety of specialties, while standalone trauma centers allow ER nurses to specialize in fast-paced emergency care and triage. 
  • Emergency response specializations – If relevant, include any experience you’ve had in clinical emergency response situations beyond the emergency room setting. These types of specializations may include flight nursing, Tactical Emergency Medical Support (TEMS) nursing, disaster response nursing, mass casualty incident (MCI) nursing, Critical-Care Transport (CCT) nursing, and emergency management. You can also include specific certifications you’ve earned, such as Trauma Nursing Core Course (TNCC) and Emergency Nursing Pediatric Course (ENPC), as well as the aforementioned ACLS, PALS, and CEN certifications.
  • Accomplishments – Showcase your positive impact on the lives of your patients, your teams, and your healthcare facility. Include your patient satisfaction ratings, detail instances of improved patient outcomes, and display specific leadership roles you took on within an emergency department. You may also want to include volunteer positions, advanced training certifications, and any special skills you’ve acquired throughout your career. 
  • Field-specific keywords – Nowadays, many hiring managers use applicant tracking systems to sort potential candidates by the specifics of their resumes. To make sure you aren’t filtered out from any prime positions, you’ll want to include keywords relevant to the field of ER nursing. Depending on your experience, these may include: 
    • Critical care
    • Cardiac nursing
    • Triage
    • Pediatric emergency nursing
    • Stabilization
    • Disaster response
    • Community outreach
  • Visually appealing elements – When formatting your resume, ensure the structure is clean and organized. Use lines or bold fonts to separate sections, list job responsibilities using bullet points, and use a readable font like Times New Roman, Verdana, or Arial. It’s also best to keep your resume under one page to ensure it’s succinct and on-topic.

Find an ER Nurse Position With Host Healthcare

Your emergency nurse resume is an opportunity to showcase your unique story and expertise. To that end, make sure to include must-haves from traditional resumes, such as objective statements, work experience, skill sets, and education. To elevate your resume and make it enticing to ER employers, however, you’ll also want to spotlight the specializations, certifications, and accomplishments that prove your prowess in the field. 

And, if you’re interested in exploring new and exciting travel nursing job opportunities, start your journey with Host Healthcare.

When you apply, you’ll instantly get access to thousands of premium healthcare positions across the entire spectrum of specialties. Whether you’re best suited to emergency medicine, critical access, NICU/PICU, or wound care, there’s a rewarding role waiting for you. With premium benefits, competitive pay, 401k matching, and housing assistance, you’ve got our full support so that you can focus on delivering exceptional care. 

Get started today.

 

Sources: 

Emergency Nurses Association. “Emergency Nursing – Is It Right for You.” Emergency Nurses Association, https://www.ena.org/membership/why-emergency-nursing. 

“Trauma Center Levels Explained.” American Trauma Society, https://www.amtrauma.org/page/traumalevels. 

NurseJournal Staff. “Resume Guide for Nurses: How to Tailor Your Nursing Resume.” NurseJournal, 27 Apr. 2022, https://nursejournal.org/resources/nursing-resume-guide/.