Importance
Neither a registered nurse cover letter nor a resume is much good if it does not hold information of the applicant’s achievements. To be fair, you can get away with not mentioning your accomplishments in a cover letter – you can talk about your skills instead – but if you write a resume without them, you may not be considered a top candidate. Why? For the simple reason that employers like to know what you have done in the past that made a positive effect on the facility that you were working for. And they need to know this so that they can look forward to you doing the same for their facility.
Fortunately, for most of us, thinking of an achievement is no big deal. But if you get stuck at determining what your achievements have been in the past, you can always look back and reflect on what you did that had favorable outcomes.
Alert: Do not mix up achievements and job duties – they are not the same!
So how would a registered nurse make her achievements obvious in her resume? See the sample statements below:
Sample Achievements for Registered Nurse Resume
• Developed and implemented a series of dedicated care plans aimed at assisting suicidal patients with rehabilitation and psychological help
• Selected as one of the 5 student nurses to be inducted into a laboratory training program, as part of a rigorous selection process
• Simultaneously treated 6 victims of the same accident – all of them being discharged at the end of the day, owing to implementation of aggressive and well thought out nursing care procedures
• Reined in a surgical procedure during the time that the surgeon had a temporary blinding spell, by making sure that patient was handled properly and no blood loss was eminent
• Offered training in neo-natal intensive care and cardiac care units owing to exceptionally well-placed work duties as an emergency nurse in both areas
• Suggested a separate emergency care unit for patients with chronic illnesses such as Lupus, MS and Fibromyalgia and achieved a 50% increase in medical care response
• Diagnosed a patient with bowl cancer (post emergency staff sending him off after treating him for gastroenteritis) by recognizing the symptoms and ordering immediate tests