Nurse Practitioners Provide Solutions to the Healthcare Crisis

AUSTIN, Texas, Nov. 15, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Nurse practitioners (NPs) across the country are celebrating National NP Week, November 13 – 19.

As the healthcare provider shortage crisis looms, NPs offer the high-quality, cost-effective, patient-centered services needed to help solve the increasing demand for access to quality healthcare in the United States.

NPs are licensed, expert clinicians who have been providing primary, acute and specialty healthcare services for nearly half a century.  In addition to diagnosing and managing acute and chronic illness, NPs place a strong emphasis on health promotion and disease prevention, working as a partner with their patients to help them make educated healthcare decisions and healthy lifestyle choices.

More and more, institutions and thought leaders are calling on lawmakers to allow NPs to practice to the full scope of their education and training and to recognize them as full partners, with physicians and other healthcare professionals, in redesigning healthcare in the United States.

Last year, the Institute of Medicine and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation released a report entitled The Future of Nursing:  Leading Change and Advancing Health, which explores nurses' roles and responsibilities, and cites NPs as a key component in providing healthcare to all Americans.

Penny Kaye Jensen, DNP, APRN, FNP-C, FAANP is President of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners.  "Nurse practitioners have a proven track record of success, and research has shown that they provide high-quality primary, acute and specialty care to patients of all ages and walks of life," Dr. Jensen said.  "The high level of satisfaction and confidence that patients have in NPs is evidenced by the approximate 600 million visits that are made to NPs each year."

National NP Week is a time to celebrate these unique healthcare providers.  It is also an opportunity to remind lawmakers that now is the time to give consumers the freedom to choose among all qualified providers by removing scope-of-practice barriers, and expanding collaborate efforts to provide high-quality care.  

The American Academy of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) is the oldest and largest national professional organization for NPs of all specialties. AANP represents the interests of approximately 148,000 NPs in the country and advocates for the active role of NPs as providers of high-quality, cost-effective, comprehensive, patient-centered and personalized healthcare.  For more information, visit www.aanp.org.  To locate an NP in your community, go to npfinder.com.

SOURCE American Academy of Nurse Practitioners