The Role of Nurse Practitioners in Healthcare Organizations

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What is a nurse practitioner? A nurse practitioner is a nurse who is qualified to treat certain medical conditions without the direct supervision of a doctor. What does this mean to hospitals and clinics in this time of changing healthcare dynamics, with a shortage of general practice physicians and hospitals looking into alternatives to fill the gaps? Nurse practitioners have had a brief history in the whole spectrum of medical history. They have had a difficult course in becoming what they are today and for the future of the practice. Thelma Ingles helped to pioneer nurse practitioners during the 1950s at Duke University. She worked alongside Eugene A. Stead Jr., MD, to help lay the foundation for what nurse practitioners would become. They designed the curriculum to expand what a nurse was taught to understanding the basics of examinations and taking patient history. At Duke, they envisioned a new healthcare professional that would take the place of a physician in the routine care performed by a physician in a hospital setting. Experts had already predicted of the future sho...

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