Recently Bloomberg released their first in a series of articles on Advanced Practice Nursing. Practitioners. This first installment focused on nurse practitioner education, offering harmful and unsubstantiated opinions regarding the educational preparation and subsequent care provided by U.S. based Nurse Practitioners to patients across the United States. As dedicated nurse practitioner faculty and nurse practitioners (NPs), each with over 30 years’ experience in the field, we denounce this misguided reporting as irresponsible and dangerous to patient safety, as we did almost five years ago in Becker’s Hospital Review rebutting a similar article. Perpetuating the messaging that NPs are “unsafe” is old, tired, and unsupported by peer-reviewed research.
We would like to thank Bloomberg, however, for highlighting an important disparity in federal funding for health professions; one which has already been shown to level the playing field for health professions training, a major point in the article. Bloomberg discussed in detail that Nurse Practitioner programs, or even worse, their students, are made to find their own preceptors, leaving room for alleged substandard training environments. In the current educational model, clinical preceptors (Advanced Practice Registered Nurses and Physicians) volunteer their services to train the next generation of Nurse Practitioners.
As NP faculty we know this is not sustainable long term, and that fair compensation for critical clinical preceptors levels the playing field for health professions training, also a major point in the article. Case in point - under the Affordable Care Act, the federal government sponsored pilot funding for NP student preceptorships - the GNE (Graduate Nursing Education) Demonstration Project. It was successful by all outcome metrics, but most importantly, the GNE proved that paying for preceptors of Nurse Practitioner students increased the quality and availability of clinical placement sites and instructors. The GNE cost $176 million for the five years of the project. Meanwhile, the US federal and state governments pay over 15 billion dollars annually for physician resident training in the United States.
Many states, and the federal government, have introduced legislation which would improve funding of Nursing education. US Senate Bill 3770, if passed, would increase necessary funding for nursing education, including funding similar to the GNE, again allowing colleges of nursing to reimburse some preceptors. In Illinois, HB 2374 would create a tax credit for preceptors of Advanced Practice Registered Nurses (APRNs), again helping to reimburse preceptors. Measures such as these will facilitate higher quality preceptors for Nurse Practitioners and other APRN students, thereby significantly reducing the strain on an already strained physician and APRN workforce tasked with teaching Advanced Practice Nursing students.
It is true that there can be variation of education quality, but standards exist for this reason. Nursing programs are regulated by the Commission on Collegiate Nurse Education (CCNE) and
therefore the US Department of Education. Every NP must pass standardized board certification exams and qualify as per their state requirements. Every state, as well as required certification bodies, require ongoing education to remain licensed and certified. These measures ensure that the care patients receive high quality care. Nurse Practitioners and all APRNs will continue to provide care to patients, in the US and around the world. It only makes sense to fund the training that solidifies the years of education they receive.
Sincerely,
Raechel Ferry-Rooney DNP, APRN-ANP-BC
Angela Moss PhD, APRN
Rose Milano DNP, ACNP-BC
Ben Inventor PhD, CNP
Yvonne Tumbali DNP, APRN, ACNP-BC
Kanako Ishida DNP, FNP-BC
Marc K. Balatero, MSN, RN, CNL
All above signatories are Rush University College of Nursing faculty and active Advanced Practice Nursing clinicians.