Nursing credentials and certifications

Nursing credentials and certifications are the various credentials and certifications that a person must have to practice nursing legally. Nurses' postnominal letters (abbreviations listed after the name) reflect their credentials—that is, their achievements in nursing education, licensure, certification, and fellowship. The letters usually appear in the following order:

• Highest earned academic degree in or related to nursing (e.g. "DNP" or "PhD")
• Nursing licensure (e.g. "RN," "LPN")
• Nursing certification (e.g. "CCRN")
• Nursing fellowship (e.g. "FAAN")

Generally, credentials are listed from most to least permanent. A degree, once earned, cannot, in normal circumstances, be taken away. State licensure is active until retirement and otherwise only revoked in cases of serious professional misconduct. Certifications generally must be periodically renewed by examination or the completion of a prescribed number of continuing education units (CEUs). This is often called maintenance of certification.

Nurses may also hold non-nursing credentials including academic degrees. These are usually omitted unless they are related to the nurse's job. For instance, those with master's degrees usually do not list their bachelor's degrees (only the highest earned degree), and a staff nurse would likely not list an MBA, but a nurse manager might choose to do so.

Some nurses who achieve a master's degree (MSN) leave the patient-care aspect of nursing, and practice in a more managerial role. An example would be earning an MSN in healthcare risk management. Such a nurse, while still fully an accredited nurse, will likely become the risk manager for a hospital, working in health administration rather than direct care and perhaps even becoming the director or manager of the risk-management department. In this role, he or she may never see another patient except while doing hospital inspections, or perhaps talking to a patient or the patient's family about a quality-of-care concern. In this role, the nurse becomes something similar to an auditor and a teacher of patient care quality and risk for the entire hospital staff. This nurse likely will also get the certification CPHQ: Certified Professional in Healthcare Quality.

Nursing credentials are separated from the person's name (and from each other) with commas. Usually, no periods are placed within the credentials (e.g. "BSN" not "B.S.N.")