Nurse
Practitioner
Nurse Practitioners (NPs) are primary and specialty care providers who offer patients and their families a combination of nursing and health care services.
NPs play a key role in patient care, diagnosing, developing, and implementing treatment plans for those with acute and chronic illness.
Nurse Practitioners can perform a variety of specialized tasks including prescribing medications, monitoring a patient's status, educating patients, counseling patients, ordering lab tests, and ordering other diagnostic tests.
Nurse Practitioners may work in a wide variety of diverse settings including hospitals, in-patient units, out-patient units, health maintenance organizations, extended-care facilities, free-standing nurse-run primary-care clinics, private-practice offices, home health, and schools.
Those who wish to pursue a career as a Nurse Practitioner should be excellent collaborators who can work well independently and in teams. Nurse Practitioners should also be experts at collecting, analyzing, and labeling health problems, as well as differential diagnosis, and risk taking.
Career Outlook
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, nurse practitioners will be in high demand, especially in inner cities and rural areas that are usually medically underserved.
Education
and Other Requirements
Note: These are general requirements and
may vary by employer or state.
Find a School That Offers Nursing Programs Near My City/State or Find an Online Nursing Program.