Top 12 PACU RN Skills to Put on Your Resume
Post-anesthesia care moves fast. PACU RNs blend sharp clinical judgment with calm, clear patient care, often in the first fragile minutes after surgery. A resume that shows these skills—precise, practical, and proven—can open doors.
PACU RN Skills
- ACLS Certification
- PALS Certification
- EKG Interpretation
- Epic Systems
- Pain Management
- Patient Monitoring
- IV Insertion
- Sedation Recovery
- Oxygen Therapy
- Cerner Millennium
- Wound Care
- Hemodynamic Stability
1. ACLS Certification
Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support (ACLS) training equips PACU RNs to recognize and manage cardiac and respiratory emergencies, lead resuscitation, and coordinate team responses using evidence-based algorithms.
Why It's Important
In the PACU, deterioration can be sudden. ACLS skills help RNs identify red flags early and act fast—airway, breathing, circulation—giving patients a safer path out of anesthesia.
How to Improve ACLS Certification Skills
Review updates regularly: Revisit American Heart Association guideline changes and focused updates; refresh before every renewal cycle, not just during it.
Run mock codes: High-fidelity simulations with debriefs sharpen timing, communication, and role clarity.
Deliberate practice: Drill rhythms, drug dosing, and airway sequences until they’re automatic under pressure.
Team training: Practice closed-loop communication and leadership during interdisciplinary scenarios.
Ask for feedback: After real events, review what worked, what didn’t, and adjust.
How to Display ACLS Certification Skills on Your Resume
2. PALS Certification
Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) validates your ability to assess, resuscitate, and stabilize infants and children—vital in mixed-population recovery units or perioperative pediatric settings.
Why It's Important
Pediatric physiology isn’t adult physiology in miniature. PALS ensures you can escalate care for children quickly and accurately when seconds count.
How to Improve PALS Certification Skills
Refresh core content: Review current PALS algorithms, pediatric dosing, and airway adjuncts.
Hands-on simulation: Practice pediatric codes, respiratory failure scenarios, and shock recognition with realistic manikins.
Scenario variety: Include post-op laryngospasm, bronchospasm, and opioid-induced respiratory depression in drills.
Study groups: Share cases, strip interpretations, and debriefs with colleagues.
Continuing education: Seek pediatric-focused workshops and webinars through organizations such as the Emergency Nurses Association and AACN.
How to Display PALS Certification Skills on Your Resume
3. EKG Interpretation
EKG (ECG) interpretation means reading the heart’s electrical story—rate, rhythm, intervals, ischemia, and conduction issues—to catch complications common after anesthesia, fluid shifts, or electrolyte disturbances.
Why It's Important
From SVT after emergence to bradycardia, QT prolongation, or ischemic changes, timely recognition guides interventions that steady recovery.
How to Improve EKG Interpretation Skills
Master the basics: Intervals, axis, morphology, and hallmark features of common arrhythmias.
Daily strip practice: Short, frequent reviews build pattern recognition.
Link physiology to patterns: Connect rhythm changes to causes—hypoxia, hypovolemia, hypokalemia, pain, or anesthetic effects.
Use case banks and apps: Work through mixed-difficulty cases; test yourself on rate/rhythm at a glance.
Peer review: Discuss tricky strips during handoffs or huddles to calibrate interpretations.
How to Display EKG Interpretation Skills on Your Resume
4. Epic Systems
Epic is a widely used electronic health record that supports real-time charting, orders, handoffs, and clinical decision support. For PACU RNs, it streamlines documentation, safety checks, and coordination with anesthesia and surgery teams.
Why It's Important
Clear, accurate, timely documentation reduces errors and makes transitions safer—from OR to PACU, then onward to the unit or home.
How to Improve Epic Systems Skills
Personalize your tools: Build SmartPhrases, SmartLinks, and SmartLists that fit PACU flow.
Tighten handoffs: Use standardized templates and secure messaging to ensure nothing critical gets lost.
Leverage decision support: Enable alerts for high-risk meds, allergies, and abnormal vitals; adjust alert thresholds sensibly to avoid fatigue.
Optimize pain documentation: Align assessments, reassessments, and interventions so analgesia is both fast and traceable.
Stay current: Take update classes when new versions roll out; small tweaks save minutes per patient.
How to Display Epic Systems Skills on Your Resume
5. Pain Management
Pain control in PACU relies on rapid assessment and multimodal therapy—opioid-sparing regimens, regional techniques, and nonpharmacologic strategies—to restore comfort and function without oversedation.
Why It's Important
Good analgesia speeds mobilization, reduces complications, and improves the entire perioperative experience.
How to Improve Pain Management Skills
Use structured scales: Numeric Rating Scale, Wong-Baker, or CPOT for nonverbal patients; reassess at defined intervals.
Think multimodal: Combine acetaminophen, NSAIDs (if appropriate), gabapentinoids, regional blocks, and low-dose opioids as needed per orders and protocols.
Align with ERAS: Follow Enhanced Recovery After Surgery principles to reduce opioid exposure and nausea.
Partner with anesthesia: Coordinate timing for regional anesthesia top-offs, rescue blocks, or antiemetic adjustments.
Educate patients: Set expectations, explain options, and watch for side effects early.
How to Display Pain Management Skills on Your Resume
6. Patient Monitoring
Continuous observation of airway, breathing, circulation, neurologic status, temperature, and surgical sites—plus trend awareness—drives safe discharge decisions in PACU.
Why It's Important
Early detection of respiratory depression, bleeding, arrhythmias, or hemodynamic shifts prevents spirals and shortens recovery time.
How to Improve Patient Monitoring Skills
Standardize assessments: Use the Modified Aldrete Score; add sedation scales like RASS or POSS.
Broaden monitoring: Apply capnography for patients on opioids or with OSA risk; monitor temperature to prevent hypothermia-related complications.
Refine escalation: Define clear thresholds for notifying anesthesia, activating rapid response, or initiating protocols.
Tighten team communication: Use brief, focused updates and secure messaging to shorten response times.
Keep current: Review new device features and alarm management practices to reduce false alarms while catching real danger.
How to Display Patient Monitoring Skills on Your Resume
7. IV Insertion
Starting peripheral IVs reliably—choosing the right site and catheter, maintaining asepsis, and troubleshooting difficult access—is foundational in PACU for meds, fluids, and quick interventions.
Why It's Important
Fast, dependable access keeps therapy on time and complications in check.
How to Improve IV Insertion Skills
Know your anatomy: Match vein and gauge to therapy needs; preserve future access when possible.
Aseptic to the letter: Skin prep, no-touch technique, securement, and timely dressing changes reduce infection risk.
Use technology: Ultrasound guidance or near-infrared vein visualization boosts success for difficult sticks.
Stabilize and secure: Use stabilization devices and tension-free taping to prevent dislodgement.
Reflect and refine: Track attempts, success rates, and complications; learn from patterns.
How to Display IV Insertion Skills on Your Resume
8. Sedation Recovery
Guiding patients safely from sedation to alertness demands vigilant airway management, hemodynamic checks, pain and nausea control, and cognitive assessment.
Why It's Important
Complications—airway obstruction, hypoventilation, hypotension, delirium—tend to surface here. Tight monitoring prevents harm.
How to Improve Sedation Recovery Skills
Airway first: Jaw support, oral/nasal airways, and suction at the ready; escalate oxygen delivery devices as needed.
Track sedation: Use RASS or POSS; titrate analgesics and sedatives to effect while avoiding oversedation.
Anticipate PONV: Provide risk-based prophylaxis and rescue antiemetics; protect airways during emesis.
Environment matters: Calm, low-stimulus surroundings help orientation and reduce delirium risk.
Mobilize early: As tolerated, assist sitting and ambulation to boost ventilation and circulation.
Educate and hand off: Explain expected effects, warning signs, and activity limits; document and communicate clearly to the next level of care.
How to Display Sedation Recovery Skills on Your Resume
9. Oxygen Therapy
Supplemental oxygen supports tissue perfusion during emergence and early recovery, especially after opioids, residual anesthetics, or preexisting pulmonary disease.
Why It's Important
Preventing hypoxemia protects the brain, heart, and kidneys while patients shake off anesthesia.
How to Improve Oxygen Therapy Skills
Target wisely: For most adults, aim SpO2 around 92–96%. In chronic CO2 retainers (e.g., COPD), 88–92% unless otherwise ordered.
Pick the right device: Nasal cannula for low-flow support; simple or Venturi masks for predictable FiO2; nonrebreather for short-term high oxygen needs; escalate to HFNC or NIV per protocols.
Fit and skin checks: Ensure a snug, comfortable fit; protect pressure points and monitor for breakdown.
Titrate, don’t fix: Adjust flow to clinical status and ABG results; avoid unnecessary hyperoxia.
Infection control: Replace humidifiers and tubing per policy; clean hands before and after handling equipment.
Team up: Collaborate with respiratory therapy for weaning plans and device optimization.
How to Display Oxygen Therapy Skills on Your Resume
10. Cerner Millennium
Cerner Millennium (now part of Oracle Health) is an EHR platform that centralizes orders, results, medication management, and documentation. In PACU, it helps RNs track trends, reconcile meds, and coordinate swift, safe discharges.
Why It's Important
One source of truth for data reduces charting gaps and speeds decision-making when time is tight.
How to Improve Cerner Millennium Skills
Tailor templates: Customize PACU documentation and favorite orders to match your workflow.
Use decision support: Turn on context-aware alerts for allergies, interactions, and abnormal vitals; calibrate to reduce noise.
Integrate workflows: Streamline connections with perioperative systems so handoffs and orders flow cleanly.
Go mobile where available: Capture vitals and interventions at bedside to keep charts current.
Ongoing training: Short refreshers on new features pay back in speed and fewer clicks.
How to Display Cerner Millennium Skills on Your Resume
11. Wound Care
Focused assessment, clean technique, and appropriate dressing selection prevent infection and support healing of surgical sites in the immediate post-op window.
Why It's Important
Early issues—bleeding, hematoma, dehiscence, contamination—often announce themselves in PACU. Intervening fast matters.
How to Improve Wound Care Skills
Assess methodically: Look for bleeding, drainage amount and character, edema, warmth, pain out of proportion, and dressing integrity.
Apply evidence-based dressings: Match dressing to wound type and exudate; consider closed-incision negative pressure therapy when indicated.
Protect from infection: Strict hand hygiene, aseptic handling, and timely dressing changes per protocol.
Educate clearly: Teach signs of infection, when to call, and basic dressing care for the next phase of recovery.
Stay current: Use resources from WOCN and AAWC to keep practice aligned with current guidance.
How to Display Wound Care Skills on Your Resume
12. Hemodynamic Stability
Maintaining adequate perfusion—stable blood pressure, heart rate, oxygenation, and mental status—reflects a successful transition from anesthesia to recovery.
Why It's Important
Organ protection depends on it. Small deviations can escalate fast without decisive action.
How to Improve Hemodynamic Stability Skills
Watch the trends: Continuous monitoring of BP, HR, SpO2, RR, temp, and urine output; assess skin perfusion and mental status.
Guide fluids thoughtfully: Use ordered crystalloids or blood products to correct hypovolemia; consider goal-directed targets with a typical adult MAP aim ≥65 mm Hg unless otherwise specified.
Vasoactive support: Titrate agents per protocol when fluids aren’t enough; reassess frequently.
Pain and anxiety control: Blunt sympathetic surges that destabilize vitals with balanced analgesia and reassurance.
Temperature management: Warm actively to normothermia to reduce arrhythmias and coagulopathy.
Oxygen and ventilation: Correct hypoxia and hypoventilation fast; escalate oxygen delivery and airway support as needed.
Communicate and document: Notify the team promptly about concerning changes; record interventions and responses precisely.
Follow trusted guidance: Align with ASA and ASPAN recommendations for PACU care and escalation pathways.
How to Display Hemodynamic Stability Skills on Your Resume
