Registered nurse résumé example for ICU, med-surg, ER and travel.

Alicia Moreno is a fictional nurse, and her hospitals and staffing agency are invented. Her path is a common one: three years on a med-surg and telemetry floor, five in a medical ICU where she became a charge nurse and preceptor, then four years of travel ICU contracts across three states.

Twelve years and eleven contracts fit on one page, because the travel work is grouped under the agency instead of listed as eleven jobs, and every bullet says something only she could have written.

We sampled current US postings titled registered nurse, RN or staff nurse, including ICU and med-surg roles, and counted the skills each one mentions. Travel nurse postings are counted separately further down, and LPN, nurse practitioner and nurse manager roles are left out. The note under the list explains the method.

Credentials lead the list: BLS in 40 of 52 postings, an active RN license in 30 of 52 and a BSN in 23 of 52. After those come the parts of the job itself, like care plans (22 of 52) and interdisciplinary collaboration (23 of 52).

Postings rarely name the electronic health record. Epic appeared in 1 of 52 of them. List the systems you've charted in anyway, because a recruiter may search for one, and a unit that runs Epic will notice it. Use the posting's words for clinical work you've done, such as "care plans" or "evidence-based practice", inside a bullet that shows it.

Most nurses apply to more than one kind of unit. Keep one full résumé, then change three things for each posting: the summary, the order of your skills, and the first three bullets of your current job. Here is what that looks like.

Med-surg

Summary, re-aimed from Alicia's own history: "Registered nurse with 12 years in acute care, including three on a 32-bed med-surg and telemetry unit and five as an ICU charge nurse. Led an hourly rounding pilot that cut falls from 4.1 to 2.6 per 1,000 patient days; teaches discharge education with teach-back."

Med-surg managers look for patient load, falls and pressure-injury prevention, discharge teaching and telemetry. Her ICU depth becomes the extra that sets her apart, not the headline.

ICU

The full sample above is the ICU version: ratios of 1 to 2, CRRT, drips, ventilators, charge and rapid response. For a specific ICU, lead with its population (cardiac, neuro, surgical, trauma) and the devices the posting names, if you have used them.

Emergency department

Alicia has no ED experience, so here is a second fictional nurse. Summary: "Emergency department RN with six years in a Level II trauma center. Triage using ESI, trauma and stroke alerts, and behavioral health holds. CEN and TNCC certified, charge-trained."

• Weak: "Triaged patients in the ER." Strong: "Triaged and treated up to 30 patients a shift in a 38-bed ED across ESI levels 1 to 5."
• Weak: "Responded to traumas." Strong: "Primary nurse on 50+ trauma activations a year and lead nurse for the unit's stroke-alert drills."

ED managers want speed, range and composure, so volume, acuity mix and alert response belong at the top.

Without bedside experience, your clinical rotations are your experience. List them like jobs: the facility, the unit, the hours, and what you did, such as "Capstone preceptorship, 180 hours, 28-bed cardiac step-down: carried a 2 to 3 patient assignment by week six."

Put education and your license status near the top: "BSN, May 2026" and either your license or "NCLEX-RN scheduled June 2026". Never write RN before you hold the license. Include BLS, any certifications you've earned, and work outside nursing that shows responsibility, such as CNA, tech or patient-sitter shifts.