Curriculum

Following is a list of courses that you are required to take in order to graduate with a Doctor in Nursing Practice degree:

NSG 8000 Leadership in Health Care- 2 credits
NSG 8200 Outcome Research - 3 credits
NSG 8202 Ethics in Health Care - 3 credits
NSG Clinical Project I - 2 credits
NSG Clinical Project II - 4 credits
NSG 8352 Performance Improvement - 3 credits
NSG 8355 Health Care Finance - 3 credits
NSG 8420 Organizational Behavior - 3 credits
NSG 8470 Program Evaluation - 2 credits
NSG 8501 Technology Applications in Health Care - 3 credits
NSG 8530 Clinical Workflow & Process Design - 3 credits
NSG 8660 Nursing Management - 3 credits

For a schema click here.

 

Course Descriptions

Doctor in Nursing Practice Course Descriptions

NSG 8000 - Leadership in Health Care. 2 credits: Study of various dimensions of leadership and how they apply to the health care environment. Includes theoretical models and their application to nursing models of practice, personal and organizational integration of values, key aspects of creating and sustaining a learning organization, and leadership as partnership and teamwork.

NSG 8200 - Clinical Outcome Research. 3 credits: Focus on knowledge development in areas such as the translation of research into practice, the evaluation of practice, activities aimed at improving the reliability of health care practice and outcomes, and participation in collaborative research. The use of analytical methods to develop best practices and practice guidelines and to facilitate the evaluation of systems of care that will improve patient outcomes are emphasized.

NSG 8202 - Ethics in Health Care. 3 credits: Analysis of philosophical and empirical research in health care ethics with consideration of human diversity. Exploration of current ethical issues, including relevant contextual factors within the health care disciplines and within the student's area of scholarship and clinical practice. Emphasis on ethical decision-making and implications for the health care disciplines including the professional domains of administration, clinical care, policy, and education.

NSG - Clinical Project III. 6 credits: (Course Description will be available soon!)

NSG 8352 - Performance Improvement in Health Care Organizations. 3 credits: Examines the concept of performance management and its application to the health care industry for both larger health care organizations and smaller health care settings. Issues related to the extreme pressure exerted by both purchasers and regulatory agencies for healthcare organizations to improve its performance will be analyzed.

NSG 8355 - Healthcare Finance. 3 credits: Covers finance issues related to healthcare organizations, such as: reimburse-ment analysis, understanding the nature of costs, service line profitability analysis, and preparation of operating and capital budgets. Students learn how to analyze financial statements and their relationship to organizational decision-making.

NSG 8420 - Organizational Behavior. 3 credits: Explores the behavior of people within organizations in terms of the factors that are most influential. Those include factors related to individuals, groups and the larger organization system. The course utilizes an experiential learning process that helps students understand their strengths and weaknesses as learners.

NSG 8470 - Program Evaluation. 2 credits: Program evaluation is the systematic collection of information about the activities, characteristics, and outcomes of programs to make judgments about the program, to improve program effectiveness, and/or to inform decisions about future programming. This course examines strategies used in assessing the need for, implementation of and effectiveness of interventions. Topics include: purposes of evaluation, understanding the program, planning the evaluations, roles for the evaluator, selection of criteria and standards, development of measures, implementation evaluation, outcome assessment, qualitative methods, reports of results, utilization of results and ethical issues in program evaluation. Students read reports and prepare proposals.

NSG 8501 - Technology Applications in Health Care. 3 credits: Strategies and techniques for evaluating the functionalities of computer-based systems specifically designed to support nursing practice and for participating effectively as a -user-designer/architect of nursing-specific software and skills in using and training others to use these nursing software applications.

NSG 8530 - Clinical Workflow & Process Redesign. 3 credits: Integrates ancillary and clinical processes with the flow of quality information throughout a healthcare facility to allow efficient decision-making by healthcare professionals. Prerequisites: HIM 6502 or permission of the department.

NSG 8660 - Nursing Management. 3 credits: Integration of organizational and management theories within the context of the nursing process applied to the delivery of nursing services in a variety of settings and systems. The role of the advanced practice nurse in various levels of management is analyzed and core abilities required of the manager emphasized. Factors affecting the dynamic changes in the health care system and delivery of nursing care are investigated.