National Registered Nurse Practice Development Center
Empowering Nurses For Evolving Roles In Healthcare

The National Registered Nurse Practice Development Center (National RN) empowers registered nurses (RN) by providing certificate courses to advance healthcare equity and prepare them for new and emerging roles in healthcare.

Since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, nurses have been called upon to play central roles in care coordination, population health improvement and public health emergency response. These areas are essential to enhancing healthcare equity and implementing evidence-based strategies aligned with national initiatives. While nurses are stepping into these crucial positions, many received little to no education specific to these roles in their undergraduate education. They must rely on ‘on-the-job’ training, which tends to be employer-specific and inconsistent. This can limit their ability to fully contribute, leading to frustration and often prompting them to leave the organization or profession.

Investing in nursing role and practice development can help nurses contribute more effectively and confidently to implementing evidence-based strategies that improve health outcomes. National RN’s courses provide a framework that supports nursing role development consistent with current standards of practice, drives excellence in service delivery and promotes long-term retention within healthcare organizations.

“Healthcare organizations can use our programs to establish a consistent standard of nursing role development which can then be augmented with their own organization-specific orientation and trainings,” says Kelly Kruse Nelles, MS, RN, APRN-BC, founder & CEO.

Building Skills to Promote Health Equity

National RNs practice-focused approach creates a learning space that fosters an ‘equity-minded’ nursing workforce.

The Future of Nursing reports, published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine in 2010 and 2020, examine the critical role of nursing in improving healthcare and recommend its contribution to ensuring equity. It emphasizes that a nation can thrive when all individuals—regardless of their identity, location or income—have the opportunity to live the healthiest life possible. This concept of equity is particularly significant to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and, by extension, to healthcare organizations that must demonstrate their commitment.

Achieving this involves possessing the knowledge and skills to eliminate barriers to equity, including health disparities, vulnerability and social determinants that impact an individual’s ability to achieve optimal well-being. National RNs courses, including the National RN Case Manager Certificate Program, the National RN Population Health Nurse Certificate Program and the Nurses Respond Now Priority Training, integrate health equity concepts into healthcare practice.

The National RN Case Manager Certificate Program is designed to prepare RNs for new and emerging case manager, care manager and advanced care coordination roles that focus on improving the health of chronically ill people and at risk populations while assuring high-quality care and lower costs.

The National RN Population Health Nurse Certificate Program prepares nurses for new responsibilities and roles focused on improving the health of populations in primary, ambulatory and community-based settings.

The Nurses Respond Now Priority Training prepares frontline clinical nurses to address the needs of vulnerable populations during a public health emergency that can better support public health initiatives and address social needs to improve health outcomes.

The courses are designed to help nurses fully understand the healthcare system they work in and how current health policies, payment structures, and outcome measurement influence nursing practice and healthcare delivery. National RN builds on this knowledge by introducing nurses to national initiatives and evidence-based strategies that have proven to improve health outcomes and can be integrated into nursing practice.

All curriculums are faculty-guided, featuring prompts, examples and case scenarios integrated into the overview lectures. Selected learning activities, readings and recommended practice development tasks support the application of new knowledge. In addition, RNs can use self-assessment quizzes to verify their understanding of the topics, participate in faculty-led discussions and join active learning collaboratives focused on translating and applying new knowledge into practice.

Delivering Trusted, Credentialed Education

A certificate program format is the key aspect of National RNs approach.

The American Association of Colleges of Nursing recommends certificate programs as an effective way to equip practicing nurses with the specialized competencies required in their new roles.
Unlike workshops or conferences, a certificate program is particularly effective for practicing nurses who must quickly and efficiently acquire specialized knowledge to enhance patient care. These programs are designed to accommodate their demanding schedules, allowing participants to access the learning platform anytime. It represents a structured acquisition of knowledge over time, building on their existing degrees while offering flexibility and convenience for continuous professional development.

All National RN programs and courses have received approval for professional development activities in accordance with the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC), the gold standard for nursing professional development activities. This ensures that the programs meet the highest standards of quality and relevance.

“RNs who have completed our programs consistently report increased knowledge and confidence to implement their new role in practice,” says Nelles.

An Arizona tribal health center, which faced the growing complexity of case management, integrated the National RN Case Manager Certificate Program into its onboarding process for newly hired nurses. It ensured nurses stepping into case or care management roles were equipped with the essential knowledge and gained the confidence to effectively implement their responsibilities.

Similarly, National RN collaborated with the Rural Wisconsin Health Cooperative to conduct a statewide training initiative for RNs working in critical access hospitals and clinics. The focus was to prepare these nurses as RN case managers and care managers, specifically for implementing transitional and chronic care management. The partnership streamlined care coordination and strengthened the healthcare infrastructure across rural communities, reinforcing the value of structured, specialized training. The same was true for a New York academic health center who used this program to prepare a large cohort of RNs for work with high need populations in a large urban setting.

Shaping The Future Of Nursing

National RN continuously engages with nurses and healthcare leaders to address the evolving learning needs of nurses and adjust its curriculums accordingly. It has begun expanding its offerings to include Equity-Minded Team-Based Care, which discusses the evidence supporting a shift to team-based care to improve health outcomes for vulnerable and chronically ill populations and examines evidence-based strategies that equity-minded teams can use in practice. National RN has already received several requests from quality-focused organizations to collaborate on patient-centered care strategies.

“We are committed to supporting full-scope nursing practice and the potential of what nurses can accomplish and contribute in these emerging and needed areas of practice,” says Nelles.
It is also partnering with rural health organizations to launch the National RN Population Health Nurse Certificate Program, which will be available nationally in January 2025. This program is designed to provide a foundational nursing framework of population health and population management that can increase nurses knowledge, confidence, and skills in improving health outcomes and better utilization of healthcare resources for groups of people in the healthcare systems they work in.

National RN’s work in emergency preparedness continues to develop. National RN is proud to serve as the curriculum and education partner for the Wisconsin Center for Nursing, who received an innovation award from the AARP Center for Health Equity through Nursing in support of this project. With many initiatives underway and more on the horizon, National RN remains committed to advancing health equity through nursing workforce practice and education.

Supporting the rapid translation of new knowledge into practice by providing busy nurses with focused practice development courses, National RN remains aligned with current evidence and national healthcare initiatives. It ensures that nurses achieve remarkable professional growth and remain at the forefront of transforming the healthcare system.