Preparing Nurse Practitioner Students to Practice in Rural Primary Care.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Gaps remain in rural primary care. To fill this gap, nurse practioner (NP) graduates may need additional training using a rural-specific curriculum framework to be ready to practice in rural primary care. METHOD: Ten NP students participated in a 16-week rural immersion. Preand postsurveys, online journaling, self-guided testing, simulation events, and postcourse focus groups were used to evaluate student progress using directed content analysis to identify key themes and to verify, organize, and categorize the collected data. RESULTS: Students reported gains in rural culture competence, increased skills in health literacy and patient advocacy, improved communication and negotiating ethical issues with patients, and increased awareness of challenges in rural health care and the importance of resilience. CONCLUSION: An immersion learning experience with targeted didactic content and clinical practicum in rural primary care can help to enhance NP students' confidence and technical abilities for providing optimal rural primary care. [J Nurs Educ. 2020;59(10)581-584.].