EMT Cover Letter Example

If you’re looking for a job as an EMT, you need to show employers that you have the clinical skills and qualities required for the job.

Writing a cover letter to accompany your EMT resume can help highlight your skills and show employers that you’re the best fit for the position.

Here are three tips to help you write an EMT cover letter:

Highlight your credentials

As a medical professional, it’s important for employers to be able to quickly see your certification and licensure, so make sure to mention your certifications at or near the beginning of your cover letter.

Our candidate opens the second paragraph of their cover letter with their certification. They go on to include their specific certifications in a bulleted list of highlights to draw attention to their credentials:

By making sure your certifications are prominently displayed, employers can quickly see that you have the right training and skills.

Showcase your EMT skills

Being an EMT requires a wide array of hard and soft skills. It’s important to highlight both in your cover letter so employers know that you’re equipped to handle all of the difficult situations that you’ll likely encounter as an EMT.

Your EMT hard skills are made up of your clinical skills and abilities and come from training and experience. These are critical skills like assessing patients and performing CPR.

However you also need a solid set of soft skills to deal with the challenges of being an EMT. These are the personal qualities that serve as great transferable skills in any position, such as perseverance, stamina, a strong work ethic and empathy.

Here’s an example of how you can include EMT hard and soft skills in your cover letter:

I am skilled in working under pressure to promptly evaluate and stabilize patients’ condition, ensuring speedy and safe transportation of the ill and injured to hospitals. I am also well-versed in 4-lead EKG, 12-Lead EKG, EVOC, HAZMAT, Emergency Response, Critical Care EMT-B, Emergency Vehicle Operations, and Ambulatory Transport.

The first sentence emphasizes that the candidate works well under pressure, a necessary soft skill for emergency responders, while the second sentence includes several key hard skills needed to perform EMT job duties.

Making sure you have a good mix of both hard and soft skills in your cover letter will help reassure employers that you’ll be a competent and effective hire.

If you lack experience, focus on education

If you’re applying for your first EMT position, it can be a little daunting knowing how to write a cover letter without experience. However, just because you lack experience doesn’t mean you lack the skills you need to do the job well.

Instead of explaining your field expertise to employers, focus on your certification and training, highlighting the skills that you learned along the way. If there were areas where you particularly excelled, mention them.

Be sure to also include all of your transferable skills. There are a lot of soft skills that make a good EMT. For example, if you’re determined, compassionate, and have nerves of steel, these are all excellent qualities to let employers know you have. Employers are often willing to overlook a lack of experience if candidates can bring a strong set of soft skills to the table.