The clinical education of primary care nurse practitioner students

Directors of 112 ambulatory care nurse practitioner (NP) programs were surveyed to determine the amount and characteristics of the clinical education of their students. The response rate was 53%. Among all programs, students experienced an average of 597 clinical hours. This number was somewhat higher among family and women's health nurse practitioner programs. The range was large--192 to 1600 hours--however, eliminating both extremes left a majority of programs within a much narrower range; the central 62% of programs were between 400 and 700 hours. Certificate programs reported more hours than did masters programs. Almost all hours were in ambulatory settings, which included a wide mixture of public and private settings. A majority of students experience part of their clinical training along with medical residents and medical students, and often with NP students from other programs and with physician assistant students. Most NP program directors find these other disciplines' programs cooperative, and the NP directors favor stronger relationships.