As payment precedents are becoming established, training sites have begun requesting monetary reimbursement more often, in ways that range from subtle hints to outright demands. For example, a few years ago in North Carolina, nursing deans negotiated with the state's Area Health Education Center to fund payments to preceptors for all nurse practitioner students. We could not afford to pay all preceptors for students in all of our programs. According to nursing deans surveyed by the AACN, preceptors and sites frequently cite productivity as a reason for not accepting students. This is a common problem and it is reality-based.
Students do slow clinic work.
Others hold that productivity isn't as great an issue as clinicians might believe. Nevertheless, in the era of managed care, decisions are driven, at least in part, by mandates to maximize time and resources. Back in the old diploma days, every hospital wanted a school of nursing because they provided cheap labor for taking care of patients. Nursing schools must help clinicians understand the importance of their educational responsibilities, says Ruth Alteneder, professor and associate dean of the graduate nursing program at the Medical College of Ohio. Assisting them to accept the fact that our students as APNs will assist them in achieving care goals for their patients seems to be our role as faculty.