Dr. Sharon Simon, Assistant Professor, Director Family Nurse Practitioner Program
ICPH Site, 540-542-6233, ssimon@su.edu

The FNP Program is designed to provide the nurse with the necessary knowledge, skills, values and experiences to assume the role of a primary health care provider in a variety of clinical settings. Didactic and clinical course content focuses on assessment and management of health promotion and health maintenance strategies, risk reduction, common acute and chronic alterations in health status for individuals and families across the lifespan and role development. Clinical experiences are provided in a wide variety of ambulatory, rural and medically underserved health care settings appropriate for the Family Nurse Practitioner student. There are approximately 600 clinical hours in the program. Graduates of this program are  eligible to take the national certification exam given by either the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) or the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners (AANP).

In addition to the 20 credits of required MSN core courses, the Family Nurse Practitioner requires 25 credit hours of specialty courses.

Graduates of the FNP program will be able to:

• Synthesize evidence-based practice, clinical guidelines and clinical judgment to improve the quality of clinical practice in diverse populations with consideration for social determinants of health.

• Apply ethical, cultural, legal and social factors that influence access, equity, quality and cost-effectiveness to advance nursing practice.

• Demonstrate, through competency-based evaluation, the delivery, management, health policy process and leadership of advanced practice nursing and population health in primary care settings.

• Create interprofessional dialogues and utilize healthcare technologies to optimize clinical decision making and evidence-based practice to support and strengthen patient outcomes.

• Construct a sustainable professional family nurse practitioner identity and practice that reflects compassionate, holistic and wellness-focused patient-centered care for diverse populations.