How many clinical hours does a University of South Alabama NP track require?

The MSN FNP track requires 600 clinical practicum hours. Those hours are completed across three practicum courses and split 180, 180, and 240, corresponding to CMN 573, CMN 575, and CMN 576, inside a 45 credit hour program.

This is the number to plan your placements around if you are an MSN FNP student. Because each practicum course carries a set portion of the 600 hours, your preceptor and site need to support the specific course you are entering, not just the specialty in general.

When we source a placement for an FNP student, we align the site to CMN 573, 575, or 576 so the hours you complete apply cleanly to that course.

The BSN-to-DNP FNP track requires 1,140 total hours, made up of 600 practicum hours plus a 540 hour DNP residency, inside a 69 credit hour program.

In practice this means the 600 FNP practicum hours are the same clinical foundation as the MSN track, with the DNP residency stacked on top. DNP students should also plan for reporting to Mobile, Alabama for roughly three to five days of orientation.

If your program materials show a different total, follow your current USA handbook, because DNP structures are the most likely to be updated between cohorts.

The Dual FNP/ENP MSN track requires 840 clinical hours, split 120, 240, 240, and 240 across four practicum blocks.

The dual track carries more hours than the single FNP track because it prepares you across both family and emergency scope, so budget for the larger clinical load when planning rotations and preceptors.

As with every track, verify the exact split against your current USA handbook before you lock in sites, since dual-track sequencing can change.

Here are the USA NP hour totals we can verify directly. Any track not listed should be confirmed against your current USA handbook rather than assumed.

We have deliberately not listed exact totals for tracks such as PMHNP, AG-ACNP, AG-PCNP, NNP, the Pediatric NP tracks, WHNP, the post-graduate APRN certificates, or the Dual FNP/AG-ACNP, because those numbers must be confirmed against your current USA handbook.

For every USA NP track beyond FNP, confirm your clinical hour requirement against your current USA handbook, because we do not publish unverified totals. USA offers many NP options, including PMHNP, AG-ACNP, AG-PCNP, NNP, Pediatric Acute Care NP, Pediatric Primary Care NP, WHNP, Dual FNP/AG-ACNP, and Dual FNP/ENP, plus post-graduate APRN certificates and a CCNE-accredited NP Residency.

What holds true across all of them is the placement model: USA is student-led, gives no guarantee of approved placement, and treats placement as an admission gate. The hours differ by track, but the requirement to secure an approved preceptor and site does not.

Whatever your track's total turns out to be, the preceptor still must be licensed in your specialty, USA-approved, and hold at least one year of experience.

Your clinical hours only count once the placement behind them is approved, compliant, and logged in CAPS. Hours completed at an unapproved site or with an ineligible preceptor do not move you toward full admission.

That is why the hour total is only half the picture. Before you begin logging hours, the site and preceptor must clear USA eligibility, Castle Branch (myCB) compliance must be complete, and the placement must be entered in CAPS by the Office for Clinical Affairs.

All of these programs, MSN, DNP, the post-graduate APRN certificate, and the NP Residency, are CCNE accredited, not ACEN; USA's institutional accreditor is SACSCOC.