What the employer checks first
Whether it is a HSE panel, a private nursing home or a home support agency, the first pass over an HCA CV is a compliance check. The person reading it is asking four questions before they read a single bullet point:
- Do you hold the full QQI Level 5 major award, or a recognised equivalent?
- Is your mandatory training current, and when does it expire?
- Have you been Garda vetted before, and for whom?
- Where have you actually done the work: hospital, nursing home, community, disability?
If the CV answers those four in the top third of page one, it gets read properly. If the reader has to hunt for them, it often does not. That is the whole logic of the layout below.
The qualification, stated exactly
The HSE lists the qualifications it accepts for healthcare assistant posts: QQI Level 5 Healthcare Support, Nursing Studies, Community Care, Health Service Skills or Community Health Services. It adds that a full major award requires a minimum of 120 credits, or eight modules, and that a component certificate will not suffice. Equivalent overseas qualifications are accepted where NARIC Ireland recognises them as comparable.
Healthcare Support (5M4339) is the most common route. On QQI’s register it is a Level 5 major award of 120 credits, with Care Skills, Care Support and Safety and Health at Work as mandatory components, a work experience or work practice module, and electives such as Care of the Older Person, Infection Prevention and Control, Anatomy and Physiology or Intellectual Disability Studies.
So write it the way the job spec reads: “QQI Level 5 Healthcare Support (5M4339), major award, 120 credits”, and list your modules underneath. Some posts require specific ones (disability services often ask for Intellectual Disability Studies and Activities of Living Patient Care), and the recruiter should be able to tick them off without emailing you. If you are still finishing the award, say so with the expected completion date. If you hold component certificates only, say that too. Claiming a major award you do not have is found out at the first document check.
Mandatory training: give it a block of its own
Nursing homes and hospitals must be able to show HIQA and inspectors that staff training is in date, so they hire people who make that easy. Put your training in its own entry under Education, with dates, rather than scattering it through the skills list. The ones that matter:
- People Moving and Handling (also written Patient Moving and Handling). Required for anyone moving people, delivered as online theory plus a classroom practical, and the certificate is valid for three years. Write the expiry date.
- Manual Handling, if you hold it separately.
- Hand hygiene and infection prevention and control. The HSE’s AMRIC modules on HSeLanD are the standard ones; name them.
- Safeguarding Vulnerable Adults, and Children First e-learning if you work anywhere near children or families.
- Basic Life Support or CPR, with the date.
- Anything setting-specific: dementia care, medication prompting, dysphagia awareness, end of life care.
Expired training is not a disaster, but hiding the date is. Write “renewal booked for October 2026” and move on.
Garda vetting: what you can and cannot say
You cannot get yourself Garda vetted. Vetting is carried out by the National Vetting Bureau only on behalf of organisations registered with it, and the employer starts the process by sending you an invitation once they intend to hire you. A vetting disclosure is also issued to that organisation, not to you, so it does not transfer between employers.
What you can say is whether you have been vetted before and when: “Garda vetted through Shannon View Nursing Home, 2024”. It tells the recruiter that a check has cleared recently, which is useful to them, and it is honest. Do not write “Garda vetting available”, and do not attach anything.
Showing placements as experience
If you have just finished the award, your 150-hour placement is your experience. Treat it like a job. Title, setting, dates, hours, and bullets on what you did under supervision: personal care, mealtimes and feeding support, hoist and slide sheet use, observing and recording, activities with residents. If the centre offered you relief shifts afterwards, say so. That single line is a reference in itself.
Care you gave before the course counts as well: looking after a parent or grandparent, a year as a home help, volunteering with a day centre. Write it plainly and with numbers. Recruiters in this sector respect it.
Bullets a nurse manager wants to read
HCA CVs drown in duties: “assisted residents with personal care”. Every HCA did that. What separates you is scale, care setting and evidence of judgement:
- How many residents or clients a shift, and what kind of unit.
- Which equipment you use every day without supervision.
- What you record, on which system, and how well: no gaps through an inspection is a real achievement.
- A time you noticed something and escalated it: a skin change, a fall risk, a safeguarding concern.
- Anyone you trained or buddied.
Two of those on each job is enough. The rest of the shift is assumed.
A full HCA example CV
Precious is fictional, and so are the nursing home, the care centre, the college and her contact details. She has two years on the floor after finishing the award. Notice that the headline alone answers three of the four compliance questions.
Open it, put your own award, modules and training dates over hers, and keep the headline format. A more senior version of the same CV, with five years in dementia care, is on the sector examples page.
Key skills for an HCA CV
Pick eight to ten from this list that you can back up, and drop the rest. Recruiters filter on these words, so use the standard terms rather than your own:
- Personal care and hygiene, continence care, oral care
- People moving and handling, hoist and slide sheet use, profiling beds
- Infection prevention and control, hand hygiene, PPE
- Nutrition and hydration support, feeding assistance, fluid and food charts
- Observation and recording, care plan documentation, handover
- Dementia care, end of life care, challenging behaviour support
- Safeguarding vulnerable adults, dignity and person-centred care
- Full clean driving licence (home support roles), languages
Mistakes that cost HCA interviews
- Writing “QQI Level 5” with no award title or code, so the recruiter cannot tell a major award from one module.
- Training listed without dates.
- “Garda vetted” with no employer or year, or claiming vetting you arranged yourself (you cannot).
- Placement missing because “it was not a job”.
- Duties instead of scale: no unit size, no numbers, no settings.
- Photo, date of birth or PPS number. None belong on an Irish CV.
- Three pages. Two at most, one if you are newly qualified.
Related guides
- TY student CV: Transition Year students asking a local business for a work experience placement.
- Leaving Cert student CV: Sixth years and recent Leaving Cert students applying for part-time, weekend or summer work.
- Retail assistant CV: Sales assistants in supermarkets, fashion, pharmacy and convenience stores, including a first move up to supervisor.
- CV with no experience: The first-job formula: what counts as experience when you have never been paid for work.
- CV examples by sector: Six finished CVs for people with a work history: retail, healthcare, construction, admin, hospitality and driving.
Frequently asked questions
What qualification do I need to be a healthcare assistant in Ireland?
For HSE posts, a full QQI Level 5 major award in a relevant health skills area: Healthcare Support (5M4339), Health Service Skills, Nursing Studies, Community Care or Community Health Services. The HSE states that a major award needs a minimum of 120 credits (eight modules) and that a component certificate on its own will not suffice. Private nursing homes and home care agencies generally ask for the same award or for you to be working towards it.
Do I need Garda vetting before I apply?
No, and you cannot arrange it yourself. Garda vetting is done only through a registered organisation, so the employer sends you the invitation once they want to hire you. On the CV, say whether you have been vetted for a previous or current employer and when. That tells the recruiter the check has cleared before, which is all they can act on.
How do I show placements if I have never been employed as an HCA?
Write the placement up as a job. Give it a title ("Work Placement, QQI 5N1356"), the setting, the dates, the hours completed and two or three bullets on what you actually did: personal care, mealtimes, hoist use under supervision, documentation. A 150-hour placement on a dementia unit is real experience and should read like it.
Which training should be on an HCA CV?
People Moving and Handling (with the expiry date; certificates run for three years), manual handling, hand hygiene and infection prevention and control, safeguarding vulnerable adults, Children First where relevant, and Basic Life Support or CPR if you hold it. Put them in their own block with dates, so a recruiter can see at a glance what is current.