General Surgery Nurse Practitioner?

[Jessy27]

Hi! I was recently reading a blog post from a woman who is a general surgery nurse practitioner. I had no idea that nurse practitioners could specialize in surgery and I was wondering if anyone knows what the process is to become a general surgery nurse practitioner? When I was looking into NP schools, I didn't find any that offered a general surgery specialty. Thanks for any information!

[Corey Narry, MSN, RN, NP]

Are you already a nurse?  You won't find a general surgery NP specialty as far as NP training programs.  There are 7 types of programs for entering the NP field: FNP, AGNP, AGACNP, PNP-PC, PNP-AC, WHNP, and NNP.  You can look up those abbreviations on your own, LOL.  General surgery is an age-specific specialty.  General surgeons operate on either adults or peds with only a few who will do both.  For that reason, you will find AGNP and AGACNP's doing this role with some trained as FNP in adult settings.  There is a push for only acute care trained NP's (AGACNP, PNP-AC, NNP) to work in hospital settings.  

[verene, MSN]

8 hours ago, juan de la cruz said:

Are you already a nurse?  You won't find a general surgery NP specialty as far as NP training programs.  There are 7 types of programs for entering the NP field: FNP, AGNP, AGACNP, PNP-PC, PNP-AC, WHNP, and NNP.  You can look up those abbreviations on your own, LOL.  General surgery is an age-specific specialty.  General surgeons operate on either adults or peds with only a few who will do both.  For that reason, you will find AGNP and AGACNP's doing this role with some trained as FNP in adult settings.  There is a push for only acute care trained NP's (AGACNP, PNP-AC, NNP) to work in hospital settings.  

You left out PMHNP! We exist too. ? 

 

To OP - I'm wondering if the person you know who works in general surgery is perhaps an RN-first assist? It's an advanced role with it's own training/certification for nurses in the operating room/surgical field, but isn't a NP role per se. (Though I think is an APRN role in some states, which may be where the confusion comes from). 

[Corey Narry, MSN, RN, NP]

15 minutes ago, verene said:

You left out PMHNP! We exist too. ? 

 

To OP - I'm wondering if the person you know who works in general surgery is perhaps an RN-first assist? It's an advanced role with it's own training/certification for nurses in the operating room/surgical field, but isn't a NP role per se. (Though I think is an APRN role in some states, which may be where the confusion comes from). 

Oh yes...thanks for adding it.

[stephadler82, BSN]

I am an operating room RN. I work with a couple of FNPs who see the surgeons' patients in clinic or inpatient and also assist the surgeon in surgery. In order to assist the surgeon in the operating room, they had to get extra certification in Registered Nurse First Assist (RNFA). To me, this sounds like the duties of a general surgery nurse practitioner.