The Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP) specialization prepares registered nurses to assess, diagnose, and treat common episodic and chronic disorders, and to provide health-promotion and disease-prevention interventions and counseling. The use of clinical decision-making and diagnostic reasoning skills is emphasized. The graduate will be prepared to provide direct patient care to individuals across the life span in primary care settings.
Graduates will be eligible for certification as an FNP in Pennsylvania through the Pennsylvania State Board of Nursing. In addition, graduates will be eligible to take the national certification examination for FNP from both the American Nurses Credentialing Center and American Academy of Nurse Practitioners.
Curriculum
The FNP specialization is offered as a 36-credit master’s degree for baccalaureate-prepared-nurses, and as a 27-credit post-master’s certificate for nurses already holding a nursing master’s degree. Transcripts of students with an entry level master’s in nursing degree will be evaluated on an individual basis for transfer credit.
Each student is required to complete a clinical practicum. The practicum (NURS 542 - Family Clinical Practicum I , NURS 552 - Family Clinical Practicum II , NURS 562 - Family Clinical Practicum III , and NURS 572 - Family Clinical Practicum IV ) is taken over four semesters. The faculty will assign the student to a practitioner(s) who will serve as preceptor(s) for the clinical practicum in the FNP program. The preceptor must be a certified registered nurse practitioner, certified nurse midwife, or a licensed physician with at least one year of clinical practice experience. Each credit of clinical equals 125 clock hours per semester so that total clinical practicum time is 875 hours for the FNP program.
Scheduling
The FNP program can be completed in 21 months of full-time study, with generally one day of classes per week and two days of clinical practicum in the fall and spring semesters. Courses are offered online with synchronous and asynchronous learning in each course. There are two in person weekends required in the program for clinical skills assessment. Part-time study is also available.
Required Software
Family nurse practitioner students are required to purchase the nurse practitioner student tracking soft-ware program to record their clinical experiences.
Academic Regulations
Any student who fails to receive a final course grade of “B” or higher in the FNP specialty courses ( NURS 530 - Advanced Clinical Assessment , NURS 541 - Family Health Promotion , NURS 551 - Health Problems in the Developing Family , NURS 561 - Health Problems in the Established Family and NURS 571 - Family Health Synthesis ) cannot progress in the program. The student may make application to the Department of Nursing to repeat the course when it is next offered. The student shall also be required to repeat the co-requisite clinical course, regardless of the clinical grade. Any student who fails to obtain a final course grade of “B” or higher on the second attempt will be dismissed from the program. A student may repeat only one specialty course. Any student who receives an Unsatisfactory in a clinical practicum course will be dismissed from the program.
Total credits for program: 36 credits
Twenty-One Month Full-Time Course of Study
Total credits for program: 27 credits
Twenty-One Month Course of Study
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