PAC & LTC

Supporting NP Preceptorship

By Patrick Luib

One of the goals of the Post-Acute Care and Long-Term Care Special Interest Group (PAC & LTC SIG) is precepting and mentoring nurse practitioners (NPs) new to the setting.

However, many NP students are unable to find a preceptor. While there is a paucity of literature about NP preceptorships, "two very real, current issues affecting the preceptor shortage are the COVID-19 pandemic and competition amongst disciplines" (McInnis et al., 2021, para. 56).

NP students are competing with medical and physician assistant students for clinical placement. Compounding this landscape is the direct impact of COVID-19 on post-acute and long-term care settings.

Subsequently, as an organization that promotes "long-term care sites as an appropriate and important primary care clinical practicum site for family nurse practitioner and adult-gerontology primary care nurse practitioner students" (Gerontological Advanced Practice Nurses Association, 2019, p. 1), members of the PAC & LTC SIG are designing an initiative to create and maintain an NP preceptor list that allows NP students to be aware of available preceptors across the nation.

The list should include an optional headshot of the NP preceptor and a short description of their teaching style.

For example, on day 1, students shadow the preceptor and then on day 2, it is all hands-on deck! They gradually get more patients to see and present in SOAP format. Students give two, 8-minute verbal reports with three differential diagnoses to the attending physicians who ask them questions, grand-round style.

Students report high satisfaction with this method because they receive feedback on improvement from the beginning of the preceptorship to the end. Notwithstanding economic dilemmas of NP preceptorship such as remuneration and productivity losses, as the impact of COVID-19 evolves and preceptor shortage increases, it is critical to pursue creative and meaningful ways to engage NP students.

Creating and maintaining an NP preceptor list is a PAC & LTC SIG initiative that supports its goal of precepting and mentoring NPs who are new to the setting.

Patrick Luib, APRN-BC, MSN
patrick.luib@gmail.com