Curriculum
This is a 55 credit graduate degree program. It is designed for part-time attendance by working nurses.
Course Descriptions
NURS 500— Confronting Issues in Contemporary Health Care Environments
Confronting Issues in Contemporary Health Care Environments examines Health care policy and politics in terms of contemporary issues related to advanced practice nursing, health care access, quality, and cost. The focus of this course is the critical analysis of health policy and legal issues.
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NURS 502 — Advanced Ethical Decision Making in Health Care
This is a course for master’s students who have already had some experience in ethical decision making, both academically in the classroom and in practice. This course will take an interdisciplinary focus, as ethical decision making at this level rarely ever is the decision of a single discipline. A variety of ethical topics will be analyzed from various perspective and depths in an effort to more broadly and more profoundly address the moral difficulties the advance practice practitioner in an interdisciplinary environment is likely to encounter.
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NURS 519 — Intro to Biostatistics
This is an introductory course which focuses on the fundamentals of biostatistics for health sciences graduate students. Excel-based and SPSS assignments will be used to supplement the content.
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NURS 523 — Methods for Health Research
The course is designed to provide professional graduate students with the skills necessary to evaluate the relationship between practice and published research. The course content includes an overview of research concepts, ethics in research, literature searching and reviews, quantitative and qualitative research methods and designs, and data collection, analysis, and interpretation techniques. An interdisciplinary team of faculty teaches the course using a problem solving approach.
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NURS 526 — Information, Innovation and Technology in Advanced Nursing Practice
This course is designed to provide an in-depth introduction to information systems and technologies that support practice and improve patient care and outcomes. Development of information management and technology skills (which meet the ANA Informatics Competencies) will be incorporated through out the course. Content is directed toward assisting the student in understand the relationships between patient care and complex information and data issues involved in clinical practice. Students will learn to use tools and strategies for building and managing information system components that require knowledge of informatics issues, standards, and relevant theories as well as evidence-based quality improvement strategies. This course also examines informatics issues within complex healthcare systems including organizational, professional, policy, ethical, social, cultural, economic, and legal factors.
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NURS 527 — Evidenced Based Approaches to Practice
This course focuses on using research to guide evidence-based practice. Communication, collaboration, and decision making skills from a multidisciplinary approach essential to collect, evaluate, and apply research to practice will be emphasized. During this course the student will learn to (1) conduct efficient, thorough searching of the research literature; (2) evaluate the quality of a body of research through an appraisal of design, methodology, and data analysis; (3) summarize the findings from an overall body of research; and (4) apply research evidence to issues of current nursing practice.
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NURS 548 — Advanced Pathophysiology
Building on a foundation of normal physiology, students are exposed to the major disturbances of normal function and the basic mechanisms involved in disease of the major organ systems. The course includes discussion of the general aspects of the common human pathophysiological conditions and syndromes.
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NURS 549 — Advanced Pharmacology
This course is designed to build on prior pharmacologic study of actions and effects of drugs on the human system across the life span. Students will study pharmacologic mechanisms of action, effects on organ systems, routes of administration, pharmacokinetics, therapeutic uses, considerations related to age and physiologic state, adverse reactions, contraindications, and drug interactions.
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NURS 550 — Advanced Physical Assessment & Diagnostic Reasoning
This course is designed to introduce the experienced clinical nurse to advanced clinical history taking and physical assessment for adult and pediatric patients. Course content focuses on concepts, theory and practice obtaining comprehensive health histories for patients of all ages and states of health. The Residency Week at the beginning of the practicum courses allows students to finish the Advanced Physical Assessment Course on Campus. Students take the final Advance Physical Assessment examination on campus. There is supervised lab time for instruction and practice prior to students re-demonstrating a graded Pass/Fail head to toe physical examination. In addition, students utilize the newly built state of the art Standardized Patient Lab to participate in a non-graded Standardized Patient Experience. This digitally taped experience allows students retrieve the encounter for self-review and for review with faculty while on campus.
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NURS 555 — Psychopharmacology
This course presents current scientific knowledge of psychopharmacology and its application to clinical problems commonly seen in a variety of settings. The course addresses advanced concepts in neuroscience, pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics, and the clinical management of target psychiatric symptoms, related to psychopharmacologic treatment of various psychiatric disorders.
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NURS 664 — Professional Seminar for Nurse Practitioners
This required course is the application and integration of the role and competencies of the nurse practitioner. The roles of the nurse practitioner as clinician, educator, researcher, expert, and leader are presented and explored. Interpretation and application of professional issues, practice issues, legislative issues, certification issues, insurance issues, legal issues, and ethical conflict resolution in advanced nursing practice are explored, and integrated into a model for interdisciplinary collaborative practice. Emphasis will be on preparing the graduating nurse practitioner for practice and this course will include both an exit comprehensive practicum (the Standardized Patient) and comprehensive didactic exam. Track specific board certification review and testing will be conducted. Finally, all MSN graduates must establish competency in oral and written communication skills as a graduation outcome.
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