NURS G823: Family Primary Care Management I Practicum
NURS G823 is the first of the four 200-hour practicums in Loyola University New Orleans' FNP routes: outpatient primary care, supervised on site by a nurse practitioner, a physician (MD or DO) or a physician assistant. Because it is your first placement, it is also your first pass through Exxat, the affiliation agreement and the Wishlist, which is why the search starts at least three months before the term.
Find your FPCM I preceptor
Your city and the term FPCM I starts.
Where FPCM I falls in each FNP plan
NURS G823 is a 3-credit, 200-hour practicum, and it is the first direct-care FNP practicum in every Loyola New Orleans FNP route. Its term depends on which plan of study you follow.
In the MSN FNP's posted 3-year plan, it comes in Fall II, the fourth term, after three terms of coursework. The BSN-DNP FNP route holds it back until Fall III, the seventh term, one term after the first scholarly project practicum, NURS G939. In the post-graduate FNP certificate plan, students who take all three core courses (NURS G805, NURS G810 and NURS G820) reach it in Fall II.
Loyola posts one plan per route and no separate full-time or part-time versions, so read your own plan of study rather than a classmate's. If your plan shows a different term, the planning math below still works: work backward from your FPCM I start date. The FNP hours page shows where the other three FPCM courses fall.
Who can precept FPCM I
FPCM I is the most flexible of the four courses on preceptor type. Under the 2025 FNP Orientation and Practicum Guide, FPCM I and FPCM II may be supervised by a nurse practitioner, an MD, a DO or a physician assistant. Whoever you choose must also clear the guide's baseline standards, including 2,080 hours of practice and board certification; see preceptor requirements for the complete set.
Two cautions apply. First, the older practicum letter for students who began before Fall 2024 allowed PA preceptors only in N812, a course from the previous curriculum, so a continuing student should confirm PA eligibility with course faculty. Second, for a site located in Louisiana, the state board's graduate preceptorship rule (LAC 46:XLVII.3543) expects the majority of a graduate student's clinical time to be spent with an APRN preceptor in the same population focus.
Taken together, a physician or PA can be a sound FPCM I choice when NP preceptors carry most of your program's remaining hours. The Louisiana APRN practice page explains the state rule.
The setting: outpatient primary care
The FNP guide requires all four FPCM practicums to be in outpatient primary care. For FPCM I, that means a practice where patients come for routine, acute and chronic primary care visits, with enough patient volume to fill 200 hours and, ideally, a diverse patient mix.
Settings outside that description need the Graduate Program Director's approval before hours count there: urgent care, hospital wards, the emergency room, nursing homes and specialty clinics. The request process is on the specialty and setting approvals page. For a first practicum, a straightforward primary care office is usually the smoother path, since it needs no extra approval.
Location is its own test. According to the bulletin, FNP practicums happen with preceptors near your home, in a state that has licensed you as a nurse and that Loyola approves for practicums. The FNP practicum letter adds a caution: be prepared to drive beyond your own city if that is where the right site is.
Your first placement request, in order
In the posted MSN FNP plan, FPCM I is the first time a student works through Loyola's placement system. The order below follows the FNP guide and the Wishlist instructions; the placement process page explains each stage in depth.
- Count back three months.The guide warns that approval alone can run three months or longer, so the search for a fall practicum begins in spring or early summer.
- Buy the two Exxat subscriptions.One covers required documents, the other STEPS placement processing.
- Clear compliance.Put each compliance item into the Required Documents area of your Exxat profile, where the APPROVE team reviews it, and add your signed FERPA release.
- Secure a preceptor and check the site.Search Explore Clinical Locations and your own network, then find out if Loyola and the site already have an affiliation agreement in place.
- Submit the Wishlist.Agency, address, contact, authorized signer and preceptor details, plus uploads of the preceptor's CV and license (NPs supply a Nursys PDF) and the signed Preceptor Agreement.
- Wait for Placement Approved.Hour one starts only after the whole request shows it and the agreement is signed.
FNP students also sign the FNP Practicum Guide acknowledgment and email it to the School of Nursing. Anyone behind on compliance items is left unregistered for the course and gets a compliance hold.
What to confirm in the FPCM I syllabus and guide
The course content of NURS G823 lives in its syllabus and the FNP practicum guide, not on public pages. Before your first clinical day, read both with these questions in mind.
- The course dates, and whether your section keeps to the semester calendar or an 8-week online session
- How hours and patient encounters are logged and verified in Exxat, and how often your preceptor signs the log
- When your preceptor talks with Loyola faculty, which the Preceptor Agreement puts at the start and the end
- When the preceptor's Practicum Evaluation Form is due
- Whether the course is graded Pass/Fail, which the syllabus marks, and the 80% standard every element must meet if so
- Any orientation the facility requires before you see patients
Keep your answers in one place. They become the timeline you share with your preceptor on day one, and they make the Exxat logs far easier to keep current.
Why FNP students choose us for FPCM I
Your first practicum sets the pattern for the other three, so we build it to be clean from the start. We find outpatient primary care preceptors near you who meet the FNP guide's rules and who have room for 200 hours in your term, and we tell you early whether the site is already under a Loyola affiliation agreement or will need the Standard Loyola Affiliation Agreement signed.
Our team gathers the preceptor's CV, license, Nursys PDF and Preceptor Agreement, then goes through each Wishlist field with you so nothing is missing when you press submit. The approval itself is Loyola's, made by its placement office and your faculty; we put our effort into a first submission that already meets their rules. Should your FPCM I preceptor back out, our search for a replacement starts at once. Read how it works or send the form below to begin.
Questions Loyola students ask
Can a physician assistant precept NURS G823 at Loyola?
Yes, under the 2025 FNP Orientation and Practicum Guide, which lets an NP, MD, DO or PA supervise FPCM I and FPCM II. The older letter for pre-Fall 2024 cohorts limited PAs to one course in the previous curriculum, so continuing students should confirm with course faculty first.
Can I complete FPCM I at an urgent care clinic?
Only with the Graduate Program Director's approval. The FNP guide puts all four FPCM practicums in outpatient primary care and lists settings such as urgent care, the ER, hospital wards, nursing homes and specialty clinics that need that director's sign-off. Get it before the site goes into your Exxat Wishlist.
Can I do my FPCM I hours at the clinic where I work as an RN?
Yes, if you file Loyola's Employed at Clinical Site Attestation. Student hours have to be kept separate from your paid shifts, in another department and on another schedule, and three people sign the form: you, your supervisor at work and your preceptor. The site also still needs an affiliation agreement.
What if my FPCM I preceptor cancels before the term starts?
A new preceptor goes through the same Wishlist uploads, and hours count only once the new request shows Placement Approved. Tell the Clinical Practicum Coordinator and your course faculty right away. Our preceptor dropped out guide covers the steps, and we start on a replacement the day you tell us.
Is FPCM I the first practicum for BSN-DNP FNP students?
It is the first FNP practicum, but not the first practicum overall. In the posted 4-year plan, the 180-hour NURS G939 scholarly project practicum comes in term 6 and FPCM I follows in term 7, so BSN-DNP students often run a project site search and an FPCM I search close together.
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.