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Nurse Practitioner

The nurse practitioner is a registered nurse (RN) with additional education and experience enabling nursing performance in an expanded role. The extent of this expanded role has not been uniformly established and can vary considerably with the job. This nurse is competent to work without supervision in many of the nursing services. For many years in rural areas, low-income areas and other places where a physician is not readily available, nurses have worked with independence being the main source of medical care in some isolated regions.

The nurse practitioner works in many settings including clinics, health centers, public health agencies, physicians' offices, emergency departments, nursing homes, prisons, industry and isolated rural areas. The nurse practitioner assesses the health status of patients by taking health histories, performing physical examinations, and ordering and interpreting diagnostic tests. This nurse consults with the physician and plans treatment, establishes a healthcare plan including preventive and maintenance measures and with approval of the physician, implements such plans. The nurse recommends medication and other types of treatment, such as physical therapy and psychotherapy. This nurse may make referrals to specialists for treatment of conditions beyond the scope of the nurse practitioner and maintains records of patient's condition, treatment and prognosis.

Nurse practitioners have a teaching and counseling role in helping patients in maintaining health and preventing illness, assisting parents to develop better physical and emotional health for their children, and counseling the elderly in maintaining good health during the aging process. These nurses may counsel the terminally ill and their families to help them through the death of a patient. They may also manage the care of women with normal pregnancies. Nurse practitioners work with and under the guidance of a licensed physician. However, there are some states in which the state law permits them to engage in independent practice.

Job Outlook
As health care reform evolves, there should be a greater role for nurse practitioners in treating primary care. Other members of the health care team rely heavily on the advanced skills and knowledge of these professionals.

Educational Requirements
To enter a Master of Science (M.S.) degree program with a major in nursing, students must first have a Bachelor of Science degree with a nursing major. Programs of study for the M.S. degree focus on clinical specialization with intensive examination of the biological and behavioral sciences and their application within the context of nursing practice, education, research and administration.

Educational Programs - Illinois