The Future Of Nurse Practitioners

Nurse practitioners are advanced practice registered nurses who have received special courses and training. They usually work closely with doctors and can perform many high-level primary care tasks. They often specialize in specific types of practice such as pediatrics, psychiatry, or obstetrics. Some establish private practices; however, most work in doctors' offices, hospitals, or neighborhood health centers. Their duties often include taking detailed medical histories and performing complete physical exams, providing diagnoses and recommending treatment plans, treating common medical conditions, illnesses, and injuries, prescribing limited medications, and counseling patients and families. They also care

The roles of a nurse practitioner are similar to that of a registered nurse, but a NP has more responsibility and works under a physician to diagnose and treat patients. They also perform follow-up appointments with these patients. A nurse practitioner is an essential part of the healthcare team when it comes to preventing illness and educating patients on how to conduct healthy routines. In many states, certain laws allow a nurse practitioner the ability to prescribe drugs to their patients (Green, 1996, p. 37). In the United States, there are over 50 million individuals that do not have health insurance. Many of these people either go without care or die because they do not have the money to pay for the health care they need. People that choose to seek help when they are uninsured tend to go bankrupt because they cannot pay

Since the inception of the Nurse Practitioner (NP) role in the 1960s, NPs have thrived in the delivery of primary healthcare and nurse case management. Despite patient satisfaction with NPs ' style of care, nurses have been critical of NPs, while physicians have been threatened by NP encroachment on MD practice. Balancing assessment, diagnosis, and treatment with caring defines NPs ' success as primary care providers. Understand the role and Scope of Practice of NPs is sometimes difficult for some to understand. The purpose of this paper is to define the role and history of NP, compare and contrast licensure versus certifications, understand NP Scope Of Practice and Standards of Care, discuss how the State Practice Acts regulate FNP practice, discuss credentialing and privileging, and differentiate between legislative and regulatory processes.

Nurse practitioners are advanced registered nurses who have been obligated with providing professional care to patients within their jurisdiction. They are expected to perform comprehensive healthcare services from caring for acute illnesses, injuries, and immunization to the treatment of chronic conditions (Cusack, et al., 2015).

Nurse practitioners (NPs), or Advanced Practice Registered Nurses (APRNs), play an essential role in the growing complexity of the healthcare system. Established in the early 1960s, nurse practitioners have served as skilled clinicians, meeting the healthcare needs of patients as the availability of primary care physicians continued to decrease. Much like a Primary Care Physician, Nurse Practitioners can serve as a primary health care providers or specialize in particular areas of health care like family medicine. Many Nurse Practitioners, for instance Family Nurse Practitioners (FNP), work in collaboration with physicians in hospitals or outpatient facilities, while others work autonomously in private practices. With their graduate-level education and clinical training, family nurse practitioners can diagnose illnesses, conduct exams, treat complex health conditions, and prescribe medications. Family nurse practitioners place a strong emphasis on wellness and prevention, but also provide treatment for everything from mild ailments to serious conditions affecting any member across the age span.

The role of the nurse practitioner includes assessment and management of clients using nursing skills and includes performing roles such as ordering diagnostic tests, direct referralsof patients to other health care providers and providing medications. NPs first originated in the united states to try and help improve primary healthcare in underserviced communities across the country. Today NPs exist worldwide in primary and acute healthcare settings in both rural and urban locations.

The health care is reforming in a way that care delivery models have been formed and people will be paying for quality of care as a whole (Fairman, Rowe, Hassmiller, & Shalala, 2011). The health care reform law is attempting to balance the system of health care resources in that a balance will be yielded to award care value over the volume of care provided. This reform calls into nurse leadership and the input of nurses who contribute the largest labor to the health care system. Registered nurses are vital in the delivery model of patient centered care system.

With the Affordable Care Act, opening healthcare to millions of people, primary care physicians would be overwhelmed with patient care. IOM suggested the transformation of nursing to fill the gap and provide quality patient care. Nurses were called to accept a greater role in the healthcare of America. Innovative technologies, aging population, and health care reorganization would make it is necessary to empower nurses who are critical to healthcare, therefore impacting the future of nursing and the quality of healthcare. (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, 2010) Nursing

Healthcare changes occurring today along with shrinking budgets and reimbursement rates for hospitals has forced institution CEOs to do more with less. Changes and restructuring of various health facilities require nursing leaders with flexibility and adaptability. Nurse leaders must also consider budgetary constraints, cost effectiveness, patient safety, and quality care while maintaining focus on improved patient outcome. The responsibility of ensuring patients receive safe and high quality care belongs to every employee in the hospital, including support staff such as IV therapy. In this hospital, this led to the development of a nurse director position to oversee the

Since healthcare domain is advancing exponentially, DNP plays vital role to prepare for upcoming challenge. Social, economic and professional challenges have magnificent contribution in the evolution of advance nurse practice. In era of Affordable Care Act and the Healthcare Reforms, hospitals and clinics are finding it increasingly difficult to manage and balance their books. DNP will be able to make a real difference in budgeting; ensuring quality of care is not compromised by lowering costs. In last few decades due to lots of immigrations in to the country access of care is major issue. Because of different language and culture, many times people hesitate to access care. To improve healthcare outcome, as advance nurse practice this is our

According Bourgeois et al. (2014), “Nurse Practitioners do assessment and management of clients, coordination of care, effective communication across intraprofessional teams and managing safe discharge plans” (p. 61). A nurse practitioner is able to identify of the nature of an illness or other problem by examination of the symptoms and design a plan of care including treatments for the patient.

In 2010 the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJK), a subsidiary of the Institute of Medicine (IOM), issued a report on nursing called, The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health, (http://www.iom.edu/Reports/2010/The-Future-of-Nursig-Leadership-Change-Advancing-Health.aspx).

Being a registered nurse affords one the option of working in many diverse healthcare settings. In any practice setting the climate of health care change is evident. There are diverse entities involved in the implementation and recommendation of these practice changes. These are led by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), the Institute of Medicine (IOM), nursing campaign for action initiatives, as well as individual state-based action coalitions. Nurses need to be prepared and cognizant of the transformations occurring in health care settings as well as the plans that put them at the forefront of the future.

From a general point of view, nurse practitioning is a health-career with good prospects for a varied work in different departments and clinics. Often working alongside physicians, Nurse Practitioners have finally acquired the prescriptive authority despite related controversies. While RN’s (Registered Nurse) focus on providing patient care, and counseling, a NP’s schedule includes more independence. “The role of the NP is more independent, and includes diagnosis, prescribing medication, and treatment of acute and chronic illnesses and injuries” (Barnes, 142). However, from my personal perspective, the variety and the services of a nurse practitioner means that one always have the opportunity to learn new things that contribute to development. The purpose of this paper is to develop the 5 educational steps necessary in becoming a NP. To further understand the educational path to Nurse Practitioning, I will discuss the transitions from a registered nurse, to a Nurse Practitioner and it’s issues. Lastly, this paper will identify various factors in the health-industry that forms controversies between NPs and physicians in topics such as prescriptive authority. .

In healthcare today, many members of a comprehensive team provide every facet of patient care. There are doctors, nurses, phlebotomists, medical administrators, nursing assistants and the very important LPN 's. Licensed Practical Nurses provide care under the supervision of a nurse, and are essential members of the healthcare team. Recently many hospitals have been laying off LPN 's and community colleges have been eliminating LPN programs. The suggestion that this nursing position should be phased out does not consider that LPN programs are a stepping stone towards an RN, LPN 's help balance an RN 's workload, and could end the nursing shortage of bedside caregivers.