Health Care Reform and Meeting the Needs for Primary Care

Professional Development and Mentorship Needs of Nurse Practitioners

“…Studies have consistently found that NPs can deliver primary care comparable to that provided by primary care physicians at equal or better quality and lower cost (Dierickvan Daele, Metsemakers, Derckx, Spreeuwenberg, & Vrijhoef, 2009;Flaskerud, 2010;Fry, 2011;Mundinger et al, 2000;Rossiter, 2013). The literature indicates that NPs provide effective, high-quality care and can safely supplement physician care to increase healthcare access in the United States.…”

“…A power analysis was conducted using G*Power (Version 3.17; Faul, Erdfelder, Lang, & Buchner, 2007) to determine the sample size needed for the interaction between two independent groups with five repeated measures. The analysis assumed a correlation of .3 (medium-sized correlation) among the five repeated measures, with an alpha (p value) of .05.…”

“…NPs are entering primary care practice in increasing numbers (Flaskerud, 2010), and it has been predicted that by 2025 only nonphysician providers such as NPs will deliver primary care to the general population (McKinlay, 2008;Poghosyan et al, 2012). The NP workforce has grown dramatically to more than 180,000 currently practicing in the United States (Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, 2011), with approximately 8,000 new NPs joining the workforce annually (American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, 2012).…”