Nurse Practitioners are health care providers with a masters degree in nursing and advanced clinical training to provide health care to the people of BC. NP’s bring a unique, holistic perspective to deliver quality health care in partnership with their clients.
What is a NP?
NP are nurses with extra training (Masters degree) who have passed written and clinical exams so they can provide medical care such as assessing, diagnosing, and treating a wide variety of problems.
They work from a holistic nursing perspective and try to see the person’s emotional, physical, social, environmental, and spiritual factors that may be affecting their health.
They also provide disease prevention care to help people stay well and guide people in managing chronic diseases like diabetes or heart disease.
What do NPs do?
-take health histories
-do physical exams
-suturing, biopsies, insert IUDs and other technical skills
-prescribe medications
-order lab tests, ultrasounds, CT, xrays, etc
-provide some basic counselling for depression and anxiety
-provide teaching for people with chronic disease
-health exams like pap tests, prostate checks, prenatal exams, breast exams
-teach people to have healthy lifestyles
How is a NP different from a registered nurse (RN)?
NPs do many more things than a RN but they are still nurses.
How is a NP different from a Doctor?
Both are primary care providers but doctors can do more than NPs.
For example a doctor would be able to provide full care at the hospital for a patient who is critically ill with a heart attack. A NP would provide care after the person left the hospital and was being seen at the clinic again.
Doctors often help NPs when a person’s health care is too complex for the NP to manage. They do not replace doctors.
What can a NP NOT do?
We can’t prescribe narcotics like Tylenol #3 or sedatives like Ativan.
Who can see a NP?
Anyone in Fraser Health can see a NP for all their medical care.
If the care is beyond what the NP can do, you will be able to get a referral to a doctor or specialist. (Alphabetical Order)