Clinical hours for LPN, AAS, and BSN

Q. · Jul 16, 2002

Very interesting information.

Thanks for posting.:)

leslie_23 · Jul 16, 2002

rhona1,

Thanks for posting the information about clinical hours.

I am currently enrolled in a 15 month LPN program. There is a total of 765 actual clinical hours (not including time spent in preparation for clinicals). We are under a new curriculum and will also be IV certified during the 15 month program (the norm here previously was for the LPNs to have to take a continuing education course after graduation).

Our program is over 60% nursing courses...

Hope this helps.

Leslie

I am "somewhere" in Louisiana...

RNConnieF · Jul 16, 2002

My LPN program had 1,000 clinical hours in one year, my ADN had 384 in one year, and my BSN has 256 in one year, 512 in the last 2 years.

NurseAngie · Jul 17, 2002

Hi Rhona,

How have you been? Thanks for the interesting information. The PN program that I went through required 24 hours of clinical per week (3 -8 hour days for clinics OR 2 -12 hour days for the hospital rotations) and this was for 9 of the 11 months of our program. We were out for 3 weeks at Christmas, so we did not have to do clinicals but for 1 week during that time. I think it came out to = about 850 hours total.

The RN program I am about to start does things a little differently. The program director said to me that 6 hour clincals two days per week is what is required. I'm not going to complain.

You must be right about every place setting their own clinical hours.

I guess that in the end, I am going to get out of nursing school what I put into it. The pressure is all on me!:chair:

Good luck with school and keep in touch!

~Angie

live4today, RN · Jul 17, 2002

I don't recall exactly the number of clinical hours endured through college to become a nurse, but I do know that we had a LOT. :eek: By the time I graduated, my brain ached, my feet hurt, and my emotions were out in zoo-zoo land somewhere. :rotfl: So, I guess the nursing instructors did a bang up good job preparing me for the world of nursing, huh? :chuckle :nurse:

RNIAM, BSN, RN · Jul 17, 2002

Actually my program is more on the lean side at least for the first year. We will only have 8 hours per week for the AAS. So even my own school is different.This will be over 5 semesters. I find this interesting don't you? What's really suprising is the level of clinical hours within each program. As you can see from the above posts even their own courses are different, so I guess the clinical skills arguement is really not much of an arguement?IMHO:wink2:

Love-A-Nurse · Jul 17, 2002

originally posted by rhona1
okay after emailing all of the state nursing boards i found this out. their are no mandated number of clinical hours for any program. each individual program dictates its own hours. the program has to contain about 60% nursing courses.
what i found was on average
lpn programs offered between 300-400 hours in a 1 year program.

rn programs offered 700-900 clinical hours in a two year program

bsn programs offer 1,100-1,300 clinical hours in a four year program.

it looks to be about even to me. i think what is important to remember is not the hours you have but what you do with them. i have witnessed a college that does clinical at a local hospital. their is more time spent in pre-and post clinical then in actual clinical.
okay i am tired. has anyone lese noticed how difficult it is to find out how many clinicla hours are in most programs? i hope i shed a little light on this. if your interested in where i got this information please feel free to leave me a post with your email and i will send you copies of the mail i received.

i agree, this is interesting. would it not also be why one person believes that his/her program was better because of this information. therefore, there is not a right or wrong answer in regards to the clinical experiences itself.

mark_LD_RN · Jul 17, 2002

finally someone posts the facts i been stating all along,:)

Flo1216 · Jul 17, 2002

I attend a diploma program and I have over 1000 clincal hours. I recently met a new hire at my hospital who graduated with a BSN and she told me she knows NOTHING. She said she has never even given an injection of any kind. I spent two days in the clinic giving vaccinations, plus in L&D I gave a lot of Depo and Hep B vaccines. And of course on the med-surg floors we have the heparin and insulin, etc. I had to tell this poor girl how to suction a trach. I feel bad for her. I guess all schools are different. I just got lucky. I also have a very small class(10) so we get to do a lot more.And my school is very focused on clinical and getting us prpared for the real thing.Maybe they SHOULD mandate a certain number of clinical hours!

Flo1216 · Jul 17, 2002

Oh yeah and she said when they did have clincal all they did was bedbaths, charting and PO meds.

mark_LD_RN · Jul 18, 2002

there is a minimum clinical hour standard for any college to be acceredited. if that is true that school needs to be avoided and reported. it is also partially the students fault, one needs to take responsibility and seek out clinical experience while in school. we passed po meds,charted and did bed baths by the middle of first semester. when i graduated i had experiences in all areas even learned how to set up and monitor ventilators. we had to be able to read telemetry strip, run codes , had course on fetal monitoring as well as management courses.