Top 12 Certified Home Health Aide Skills to Put on Your Resume
In the highly compassionate and demanding field of home health care, showcasing the right skills on your resume can significantly enhance your job prospects. This article outlines the top 12 certified home health aide skills that employers value, helping you stand out as a capable, steady-handed professional who delivers exceptional care where it matters most—at home.
Certified Home Health Aide Skills
- CPR Certified
- First Aid
- Patient Care
- Vital Signs
- HIPAA Compliance
- Alzheimer's Care
- Wound Care
- Medication Administration
- Mobility Assistance
- Electronic Health Records (EHR)
- Nutrition Planning
- Infection Control
1. CPR Certified
CPR Certified means you’ve completed formal training in Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation, so you can respond when a person stops breathing or their heart stops. In home care, timing is everything. This certification proves you can act fast and with confidence.
Why It's Important
It can save a life—plain and simple. Being CPR certified prepares you to handle cardiac or respiratory emergencies until advanced help arrives.
How to Improve CPR Certified Skills
Keep your CPR skills sharp and your certification current with these practical steps:
Refresh your knowledge: Review the latest guidance and changes from organizations such as the American Heart Association and the Red Cross.
Practice often: Get hands-on time with manikins. Muscle memory matters when seconds count.
Level up: Consider Basic Life Support (BLS) for healthcare providers if your role demands more advanced response.
Stay current: CPR recommendations evolve. Skim updates and summaries regularly.
Use online refreshers: Short video modules and quizzes can reinforce technique between classes.
Seek feedback: During recertification or drills, ask instructors to critique your compressions and ventilations.
Demonstrate and volunteer: Teaching others or serving at community events builds confidence and speed.
How to Display CPR Certified Skills on Your Resume
2. First Aid
First Aid is the immediate, temporary care you give when someone is injured or becomes suddenly ill. As a home health aide, you stabilize, comfort, and prepare the patient for further medical care when needed.
Why It's Important
Quick, competent First Aid can prevent a condition from worsening, reduce complications, and sometimes prevent a trip to the ER. It’s a bedrock skill.
How to Improve First Aid Skills
Build your First Aid know-how and keep it nimble:
Stay updated: Review current recommendations from trusted organizations like the American Red Cross and the American Heart Association.
Rehearse skills: Take periodic hands-on refreshers to keep procedures second nature.
Use reference tools: Keep concise First Aid guides or reputable apps handy for quick checks.
Learn with peers: Discuss cases, what went right, and what could improve. Shared experience sticks.
Reflect after events: Document what occurred, get feedback, and tighten up any weak spots.
How to Display First Aid Skills on Your Resume
3. Patient Care
Patient care blends personal care, basic clinical tasks, and steady emotional support. At home, you become the daily constant—ensuring safety, comfort, dignity, and continuity.
Why It's Important
It drives quality of life. Thoughtful patient care reduces complications, eases stress, and helps people stay where they want to be—home—without sacrificing safety.
How to Improve Patient Care Skills
Refine both the heart and the craft:
Communicate clearly: Listen fully, confirm understanding, and explain what you’re doing. Strong communication builds trust and eases anxiety.
Personalize care: Tailor routines to each person’s preferences and cultural context. Small touches matter.
Keep learning: Take continuing education on common home-care conditions, safe transfers, and daily care techniques.
Use simple tech wisely: Track vitals, share updates securely, and coordinate with the care team without creating noise.
Lead with empathy: Kindness and patience improve adherence and outcomes.
Prioritize safety: Scan the environment for fall risks, clutter, or hazards and make practical changes.
Protect privacy: Safeguard personal health information and uphold dignity at every step.
How to Display Patient Care Skills on Your Resume
4. Vital Signs
Vital signs—temperature, pulse, respiration rate, and blood pressure—are the quick-read dashboard of health. As a home health aide, you watch trends and flag changes early.
Why It's Important
Shifts in vitals often show up before symptoms scream for attention. Noticing patterns and acting promptly can prevent deterioration.
How to Improve Vital Signs Skills
Sharpen both technique and coaching:
Measure consistently: Use the same device and position when possible. Document clearly, including time and context.
Support healthy habits: Encourage balanced meals guided by MyPlate, steady hydration, and regular movement as approved by providers.
Promote rest: Good sleep steadies heart rate and blood pressure. Help build bedtime routines that stick.
Manage stress: Teach simple breathing, light stretching, or short relaxation routines.
Avoid risk factors: Reinforce limiting alcohol and avoiding tobacco.
Know the normals: Understand patient-specific target ranges and when to escalate concerns.
How to Display Vital Signs Skills on Your Resume
5. HIPAA Compliance
HIPAA compliance means protecting patients’ health information—how you handle, share, store, and discuss it. Confidentiality isn’t optional; it’s the rule.
Why It's Important
Privacy builds trust and meets legal requirements. Breaches harm patients and can trigger serious penalties.
How to Improve HIPAA Compliance Skills
Make privacy a habit, not a checkbox:
Know the rules: Understand the Privacy Rule, Security Rule, and breach reporting basics as they apply to your role.
Train regularly: Short refreshers keep security practices front-of-mind.
Secure communications: Use approved channels. Avoid casual chats about patient details in public or at home.
Minimum necessary: Share only what’s needed, only with authorized people.
Report quickly: If you suspect a breach or misdirected information, escalate immediately.
Respect patient rights: Patients can access their records and request corrections—help facilitate appropriately.
Document: Keep records of training and privacy incidents to show diligence.
How to Display HIPAA Compliance Skills on Your Resume
6. Alzheimer's Care
Alzheimer’s care focuses on safety, routine, dignity, and connection. It’s specialized support that adapts as cognition, behavior, and daily abilities change.
Why It's Important
Tailored Alzheimer’s care enhances quality of life, reduces distress, and supports family caregivers. It meets the person where they are—every day may look different.
How to Improve Alzheimer's Care Skills
Refine strategies that calm, engage, and protect:
Study the disease: Learn the stages, common behaviors, and what helps at each point. Organizations like the Alzheimer’s Association offer excellent guides.
Use clear communication: Short sentences, one step at a time, patient eye contact, and gentle tone.
Make home safer: Remove tripping hazards, secure medications, label rooms, and simplify pathways.
Build routines: Predictability reduces anxiety. Keep meals, bathing, and activities consistent.
Engage meaningfully: Simple music, familiar photos, light chores, or short walks—match activities to current abilities.
Seek support: Caregiver groups and helplines can offer practical tips and help prevent burnout.
How to Display Alzheimer's Care Skills on Your Resume
7. Wound Care
Wound care covers cleaning, protecting, and monitoring wounds to support healing and prevent infection. In home settings, consistency and hygiene are everything.
Why It's Important
Good wound care prevents complications, speeds recovery, and reduces pain. Poor technique invites infection—an avoidable setback.
How to Improve Wound Care Skills
Think clean technique, smart protection, and vigilant observation:
Hand hygiene first: Wash thoroughly before and after care, and use gloves as directed.
Choose the right dressing: Follow care plans regarding dressings and ointments. Change on schedule; moisture balance matters.
Watch for infection: Redness, heat, swelling, odor, or pus—report changes quickly and document consistently.
Support healing from within: Encourage protein, vitamin C, zinc, and adequate hydration unless restricted.
Document precisely: Note size, depth, drainage, color, pain, and any changes. Trends tell the story.
How to Display Wound Care Skills on Your Resume
8. Medication Administration
Medication administration means assisting clients with prescribed medications safely and accurately—right person, right drug, right dose, right time, right route—within your state’s scope and under direction of the care team.
Why It's Important
Errors can be dangerous. Accurate administration supports stability, prevents interactions, and keeps treatment plans on track.
How to Improve Medication Administration Skills
Precision and organization win the day:
Know the meds: Understand purpose, common side effects, and what to monitor. Use reliable drug references.
Organize: Use labeled pill organizers and clear schedules. Set reminders when appropriate.
Double-check: Verify name, dose, time, and route before every administration. Pause if anything feels off.
Communicate: Share observations with nurses and prescribers using clear, structured updates (such as SBAR).
Document immediately: Record time, dose, and any reactions. Real-time notes prevent gaps.
Promote independence: When safe, involve clients in understanding their regimen.
Keep training: Attend refreshers on safe medication practices and state rules.
How to Display Medication Administration Skills on Your Resume
9. Mobility Assistance
Mobility assistance helps clients move safely—transfers, ambulation, positioning—while guarding dignity and maximizing independence.
Why It's Important
Safe mobility reduces falls, prevents pressure injuries, and keeps daily life within reach. Freedom to move changes everything.
How to Improve Mobility Assistance Skills
Blend technique with tailored plans:
Train regularly: Refresh transfer methods, body mechanics, and fall-prevention strategies through reputable courses.
Use the right tools: Get comfortable with canes, walkers, gait belts, slide boards, and lift devices as appropriate.
Customize: Build mobility routines based on current strength, balance, and provider guidance.
Safety-proof the home: Install grab bars, remove clutter, add non-slip mats, and improve lighting.
Protect yourself: Apply proper ergonomics to prevent caregiver injury.
Encourage movement: Gentle, approved exercises can maintain function and confidence.
Reassess often: Needs change. Adjust plans and devices as mobility improves or declines.
How to Display Mobility Assistance Skills on Your Resume
10. Electronic Health Records (EHR)
Electronic Health Records are digital patient charts. They help the care team share accurate, timely information—med lists, vitals, care plans—so coordination doesn’t fall through the cracks.
Why It's Important
EHR proficiency means fewer errors, faster updates, and clearer communication with nurses and providers. Care gets smoother when everyone sees the same facts.
How to Improve Electronic Health Records (EHR) Skills
Focus on practical, real-world use:
Get trained on your system: Short tutorials, tip sheets, and practice sessions speed up navigation.
Use templates and shortcuts: Standard notes and smart phrases save time while keeping documentation complete.
Document clearly and promptly: Enter vitals, tasks, and observations in real time to reduce omissions.
Mind privacy and security: Lock screens, use strong passwords, and avoid sharing credentials. No charting on personal devices unless approved.
Prepare offline: Jot structured notes during visits so EHR entries are accurate and concise.
Know what to escalate: Learn which changes require immediate messaging to the clinical team.
Practice mobile workflows: If your agency uses a mobile app, rehearse common tasks so charting doesn’t slow care.
How to Display Electronic Health Records (EHR) Skills on Your Resume
11. Nutrition Planning
Nutrition planning means shaping balanced meals that fit each client’s medical needs, preferences, and restrictions. Food is fuel—done right, it supports healing and strength.
Why It's Important
Good nutrition helps manage chronic conditions, supports recovery, and preserves energy for daily life. Poor planning can undermine medications and slow healing.
How to Improve Nutrition Planning Skills
Make every bite count:
Learn the basics: Use MyPlate as a simple guide and understand adjustments for diabetes, hypertension, kidney disease, and other conditions.
Assess thoughtfully: Note allergies, cultural preferences, chewing/swallowing issues, and appetite patterns.
Plan balanced meals: Include lean proteins, whole grains, colorful produce, and healthy fats, aligned with provider or dietitian guidance.
Shop smart: Choose fresh or frozen produce, low-sodium options, and label-check for added sugars.
Handle food safely: Prevent cross-contamination, cook to proper temperatures, and store food correctly.
Monitor and adjust: Track weight, energy, wound healing, and tolerance. Tweak plans with input from the care team.
How to Display Nutrition Planning Skills on Your Resume
12. Infection Control
Infection control includes hand hygiene, proper use of personal protective equipment, safe handling of potentially contaminated items, and cleaning high-touch surfaces. In a home, you bring the standards with you.
Why It's Important
It protects everyone—patients, families, and you. Good habits break the chain of transmission.
How to Improve Infection Control Skills
Routines that never slip:
Hand hygiene: Wash with soap and water or use alcohol-based sanitizer before and after client contact and glove use.
PPE smartly: Wear gloves, masks, eye protection, and gowns based on the task and exposure risk. Don and doff correctly.
Safe injections: Use sterile, single-use equipment only and dispose of sharps in approved containers.
Clean and disinfect: Regularly disinfect high-touch surfaces and equipment with appropriate products.
Respiratory etiquette: Encourage covering coughs/sneezes, provide tissues, and use no-touch disposal bins.
Stay home if ill: Don’t risk exposing vulnerable clients.
Vaccinations: Keep recommended vaccines current, including annual influenza as advised for healthcare workers.
Ongoing training: Refresh bloodborne pathogens and infection prevention practices regularly.
How to Display Infection Control Skills on Your Resume
