How many clinical hours is Loyola's FNP program?
800. The MSN Family Nurse Practitioner program at Loyola University New Orleans requires 800 supervised hours, spread over four 200-hour Family Primary Care Management (FPCM) practicums. The BSN-DNP FNP adds 540 scholarly project hours for 1,340, the post-graduate certificate asks for at least 800, and students who entered before Fall 2024 may hold an older letter that lists 180-hour courses.
Plan all four FPCM placements
Your FNP route, city and first practicum term.
The 800 hours, one FPCM course at a time
Every FNP route at Loyola New Orleans uses the same four practicum courses, each worth 3 credits and 200 hours. What changes from route to route is the term in which each one lands. The table follows the 2026 plans of study: the MSN's 3-year plan, the BSN-DNP's 4-year plan and the certificate plan.
| Course | Hours | MSN plan | BSN-DNP plan | Certificate plan |
|---|---|---|---|---|
NURS G823 FPCM I Practicum | 200 | Fall II (term 4) | Fall III (term 7) | Fall II |
NURS G827 FPCM II Practicum | 200 | Spring II | Spring III | Spring II |
NURS G829 FPCM III Practicum | 200 (150 pediatric, 50 obstetric) | Fall III | Fall IV | Fall III |
NURS G833 FPCM IV Practicum | 200 | Spring III | Spring IV | Spring III |
Each course has its own page, starting with FPCM I, then FPCM II, the pediatric and obstetric FPCM III and the final FPCM IV. Separate full-time and part-time FNP plans are not posted, so if your own plan differs from the posted one, your plan governs.
Three FNP routes, three totals
MSN FNP: 800 hours. The program runs online and asynchronously in 48 credits across eight terms, and the four FPCM practicums fall in the fall and spring terms from term 4 onward. One Loyola document counts differently: the 2025 FNP Orientation and Practicum Guide lists 51 credits. The hour figure is the same in both. The MSN FNP page covers the full program.
BSN-DNP FNP: 1,340 hours. Here the 800 FPCM hours sit alongside 540 scholarly project hours, 180 apiece in NURS G939, NURS G942 and NURS G944. The project comes first: NURS G939 lands in term 6, a term before FPCM I, and NURS G942 shares Spring III with FPCM II. The program page says 36 months while the posted plan runs four years.
Post-Graduate Certificate FNP: 800 hours minimum. A gap analysis of your earlier coursework sets your credits, somewhere from 24 to 33, but the four practicums stay. The plan has no summer courses, and students who need the three core courses (NURS G805, NURS G810, NURS G820) reach FPCM I in Fall II.
The 180-hour courses in the pre-Fall 2024 letter
Loyola still posts an FNP practicum letter written for cohorts that began before Fall 2024. It lists practicum courses of 180 hours each under older course numbers (NURS 845, 855 and 830), and its only opening for physician assistant preceptors is N812, and then only in primary care. Today's bulletin, Loyola's FNP program pages and the 2025 guide set 200 hours for each FPCM practicum and accept PA preceptors in FPCM I and II.
The two documents describe different curricula, and a continuing student may be finishing under either one. That matters the moment you ask a preceptor to commit: 180 and 200 hours are different requests, and a PA who fits one curriculum may not fit the other.
Students weighing a move from the BSN-DNP to the MSN should know the handbook's rule as well: switching requires a Change of Program Request Form and, among other criteria, a practicum course already passed.
Started before Fall 2024? Get your per-course hour target confirmed in writing by the Clinical Practicum Coordinator or your program director before you tell any preceptor how many hours you need.
Four searches, not one
The 800 hours arrive as four separate placements, and each one carries Loyola's full process: a preceptor who meets the FNP guide's rules, a site with a signed affiliation agreement, and a Wishlist request that reaches Placement Approved before the first hour. The guide says to start at least three months ahead, and that lead time applies to every one of the four. The three-month lead time page turns it into a calendar.
The courses also ask for different things. All four are outpatient primary care. FPCM I and II accept an NP, MD, DO or PA. FPCM III needs preceptors who fit a pediatric and obstetric population. FPCM IV opens the door to a specialty placement if the FNP Director signs off, and time in the ER, urgent care, a nursing home, a hospital ward or a specialty clinic, in any of the four courses, first needs the Graduate Program Director's approval.
Because the search for one practicum usually runs while you are logging hours in the previous one, planning all four at the start of the program saves the most stress.
What the 800 hours do after graduation
The hours are your ticket to the FNP certification exam: Loyola's MSN page names ANCC and the AANP certification exam. They can also do a second job in Louisiana. Prescriptive authority there requires 500 hours of clinical practice as a licensed APRN or APRN applicant within the two years before you apply, and Louisiana's rule (LAC 46:XLVII.4513) says graduate clinical hours that met certification eligibility may be accepted toward that total. Three 45-contact-hour courses in advanced pharmacotherapeutics, advanced pathophysiology and advanced health assessment are required as well.
Keep your Exxat logs and preceptor evaluations tidy for that reason alone. The Louisiana APRN practice page explains collaborative practice and the prescribing steps.
Graduates who practice outside Louisiana follow their new state's licensing rules. While you are still a student, the practicum state needs your active RN license, and you hold a Louisiana or multistate license from the second semester on, as the RN license page explains.
How we help FNP students reach 800
We plan your FNP hours as one route rather than four emergencies. From your plan of study we map when each FPCM search has to start, then find preceptors who fit each course: primary care NPs, physicians or PAs for the first two courses, pediatric and obstetric coverage for FPCM III, and a primary care or approved specialty site for FPCM IV.
Each placement gets the same care: an early answer on whether Loyola already has an affiliation agreement with the site, the preceptor's CV, license, Nursys PDF and signed Preceptor Agreement in hand, and a Wishlist you can submit in one sitting. Approval belongs to Loyola's placement office and faculty, and our work goes into making each request complete and correct before it reaches them. Should a preceptor leave partway through a course, we go straight to finding the next one. How it works lays out the steps; the form at the bottom of this page starts yours.
Questions Loyola students ask
Is Loyola's FNP program 800 or 1,000 clinical hours?
The MSN FNP and the FNP certificate require 800. The 1,000 figure belongs to the DNP: the MSN-DNP Executive Leader requires 1,000 supervised graduate hours, counting verified master's hours. The BSN-DNP FNP totals 1,340, because the 540 scholarly project hours are added to the 800 FPCM hours.
Do Loyola FNP practicum hours have to be done in Louisiana?
No. The bulletin places FNP practicums with preceptors where you live, and the MSN page ties practicums to a state that has issued you a valid nursing license. That state must also be approved on Loyola's own lists; the licensure disclosures and the State Approvals Map show the exceptions.
Does the FNP certificate need all 800 hours if I am already an NP?
The 2026 certificate plan lists all four FPCM practicums at 200 hours and states an 800-hour minimum. The gap analysis changes your credit count, from 24 to 33 credits, based on earlier coursework. Ask the program director how your analysis treats clinical hours before you plan fewer placements.
How many hours a week does a 200-hour FPCM practicum take?
Loyola publishes no weekly figure for the FPCM courses. The hours spread across whatever dates your syllabus sets, and Loyola has not said which of its calendars, full semester or 8-week online session, graduate nursing uses. Map your 200 hours against the syllabus dates and your preceptor's clinic days early.
What happens if I have not finished 200 hours when the term ends?
Talk to your faculty of record before the term closes. An extension needs the Early Start/Extension Practicum approval form. An Incomplete is only for a student with roughly 75% of the work complete and a passing grade, and the missing work is due within six weeks of the next term's start.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-25
We check these pages against Loyola's own bulletin, program pages, practicum guides, forms and licensure disclosures. Your plan of study, your practicum guide, your program director and the Clinical Practicum Coordinator have the final word.
Loyola asks you to select your own preceptor and site. We make that the easy part.
Tell us your Loyola program, where you live and which term your next practicum starts. We find preceptors whose patients fit the course, check whether the site already has a Loyola affiliation agreement, and prepare everything your Exxat Wishlist needs.
- Preceptors matched to the course: outpatient primary care for
NURS G823, pediatrics and obstetrics forNURS G829, acute care forNURS G902, psychiatric care forNURS G856 - Preceptor CV, license and Nursys PDF, the Preceptor Agreement and the site's signer details ready for the Wishlist
- In your own community, in Louisiana or any state where Loyola approves your practicum
Start your placement plan
Program, city and term is all we need to begin.