NRS 861: your first acute care rotation at Clarkson College
NRS 861 Introduction to Acute Care Concepts is where Clarkson College's AGACNP track leaves the family practice and internal medicine settings of NRS 830 for hospital units. The 2026-27 catalog sets 150 clinical hours for MSN and certificate students and 200 on the BSN to DNP plan, with adolescent, adult and older adult patients on short sub-acute or acute care stays. Its preceptor search belongs in the semester you spend in NRS 830.
Get your placement plan
Tell us your Clarkson program and where you live. A placement advisor replies with the preceptor and site options that fit your course.
What NRS 861 covers and where it happens
The catalog describes NRS 861 as care of adolescent, adult and geriatric patients during short stays on sub-acute or acute care units. Clarkson's November 2023 AGACNP sheet, which writes the course as NS 861, turns that description into a setting: hospitalist sub-acute or acute care short-stay units.
In practice your search points at a hospital medicine service whose patients come in briefly rather than for long, complicated admissions. It is the first rung of the acute care ladder; later courses move up to medical-surgical floors, step-down, urgent care and critical care. The AGACNP clinical sites page lays out all four rungs.
The only catalog prerequisite is NRS 830 Advanced Physical Assessment. With Clarkson allowing one clinical course per term, NRS 861 is simply the next clinical course once NRS 830 is behind you, and it in turn opens NRS 862.
The preceptor handoff after NRS 830
Your NRS 830 hours were supervised in family practice or internal medicine, and the sheet accepted an MD, DO, NP or PA there. The acute sequence keeps those four credentials but filters the nurse practitioners: from NRS 861 onward, an NP preceptor must hold acute care certification, and family NPs no longer qualify.
So ask two questions about anyone you hope to keep. If your NRS 830 preceptor was a family NP, you need someone new. If it was a physician or PA, the question is whether that person works the short-stay or sub-acute units the course calls for, because Clarkson expects a preceptor's practice to relate to the course content.
Even a preceptor who continues needs fresh paperwork. Clarkson's 2023 sheets want a new site and preceptor agreement whenever the preceptor, the course or the semester changes, and the facility has to appear under its exact legal name, down to the Inc. or d/b/a.
Timing the search around Graduate Weekend
The busiest weeks of the AGACNP track come before NRS 861 starts. You are logging NRS 830 hours, which cannot start until the physical assessment check-off at Graduate Weekend is behind you, while the agreement for the next course comes due. For a student taking NRS 830 in Fall 2026, the dates stacked up like this:
- Sept. 1 to Oct. 1, 2026Nebraska Medicine's own spring window for nurse practitioner applications, if you plan to request a placement there.
- Sept. 19-20, 2026Graduate Weekend in Omaha, where the skills check-off that opens
NRS 830clinical hours takes place. - Nov. 1, 2026Spring paperwork date for the
NRS 861agreement, as printed in the older handbook and the 2023 rotation sheets. - Jan. 7, 2027Spring semester opens. The paperwork has to be wrapped up inside that opening week, and anything logged ahead of final approval is lost.
When a hospital has no affiliation agreement with Clarkson yet, the paperwork can take up to two months, so a unit you settle on in late October may not clear in time. The dates come from older documents, so check the current year against your advisor's guidance and the deadlines page.
150 or 200 hours, week by week
The catalog prints two figures for NRS 861: 150 hours for the MSN and post-graduate certificate, and 200 for the BSN to DNP under the plan effective Spring 2024. The 2021-22 handbook expects a level pace, with half the total logged by the course midpoint. The weekly numbers below are our arithmetic from the term lengths, not figures Clarkson publishes.
| Plan | Total hours | Per week, 15-week fall or spring | Per week, 12-week summer | Half by midterm |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MSN or certificate | 150 | 10 | 12.5 | 75 |
| BSN to DNP | 200 | About 13.3 | About 16.7 | 100 |
The November 2023 sheet lets up to 40 of those hours be specialty time, approved by course faculty, and adds room for as many as 10 hands-off observation hours. For MSN students NRS 861 carries the smallest hour count of the four acute courses, a sensible place to learn how a hospital service runs before the totals rise in NRS 862.
Adolescents in the description, and Children's Nebraska
The catalog's patient list for NRS 861 starts at adolescence, which can make a children's hospital look like a natural fit. For Omaha students the obvious candidate is Children's Nebraska, and it is the wrong door for this track.
Its advanced practice page covers five kinds of APRN student: PMHNP, PNP, PNP-AC, NNP and CRNA. Adult-gerontology acute care is missing from that group, so a request there does nothing for NRS 861.
Look instead for the adolescent share on the adult units where your acute care preceptor already practices. If those units rarely admit teenagers, ask course faculty how they want that age group covered before you file, because switching sites once hours have started means new paperwork and lost time.
How we set up NRS 861 for you
Clarkson AGACNP students bring us in early for NRS 861, ideally while NRS 830 is still being scheduled. Your placement advisor looks for hospitalist services near you that cover short-stay or sub-acute beds, confirms each NP's acute care certification, and screens state licensure, years in practice and family ties before you ever see a name.
We collect the facility's legal name, the preceptor's credentials and every detail the DocuSign agreement asks for, and we tell you right away if the hospital is new to Clarkson's Compliance office so the affiliation agreement gets its full two months. While NRS 861 runs, the search for NRS 862 is already underway, since that agreement comes due before this course ends. Start with the form below.
Questions Clarkson students ask
Can my NRS 830 preceptor stay on for NRS 861?
Only if that clinician meets the acute care rules and works in the right setting. Clarkson's November 2023 sheet bars family NPs from precepting NRS 861 and requires acute care certification for any NP. A physician or PA can continue if they practice on the short-stay or sub-acute units the course calls for. Either way, you file a new agreement for the new course.
When does my NRS 861 agreement need to be filed?
The dated Clarkson documents put the spring filing date at Nov. 1, with Mar. 1 covering summer terms and Jun. 1 covering fall, and the agreement then has to be finished during the term's opening week. Those documents are dated, and Clarkson no longer posts them, so confirm the current dates with your Graduate Nursing advisor.
Is NRS 861 done in a hospital or a clinic?
Usually a hospital. The catalog places NRS 861 on sub-acute or acute care units with short patient stays, and the November 2023 sheet names hospitalist sub-acute or acute care short-stay units. Clinic settings on the AGACNP sheet mostly serve NRS 830, the family practice or internal medicine course.
How many hours a week does NRS 861 take?
Divide the catalog totals by the term length. MSN students with 150 hours need 10 weekly across 15 weeks of fall or spring, and 12.5 in the 12-week summer. Doctoral students with 200 hours need roughly 13.3 weekly in a long term and 16.7 in summer. Aim for 75 or 100 hours by midterm.
Can I take NRS 861 and NRS 862 in the same term?
No. Clarkson's notes keep NP students to one clinical course per term, and the catalog makes NRS 861 the gateway to NRS 862. The acute courses run one per term in order, so a delay in NRS 861 moves every course after it, including the final NRS 864.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-27
We check these pages against Clarkson College's own catalog, program pages and published nursing documents. Your course faculty and Graduate Nursing advisor have the final word.
- Clarkson College catalog 2026-27: NRS 861 Introduction to Acute Care Concepts
- Clarkson College catalog 2026-27: NRS 830 Advanced Physical Assessment
- Clarkson College AGACNP Clinical Rotation Information, revised November 2023 (archived)
- Clarkson College Graduate Nursing Student Handbook 2021-22 (archived)
- Children's Nebraska: advanced practice provider students
Clarkson asks you to find your preceptor. We make the search the easy part.
Tell us your Clarkson track, your city and your next clinical course. We line up preceptors who fit the NRS course and Clarkson's rules, gather the details the site and preceptor agreement asks for, and flag early whether the site needs a new affiliation agreement.
- Preceptors matched to the course: all-ages primary care for FNP, acute care units for AGACNP, psychiatric providers for PMHNP
- License, experience and site details checked against Clarkson's rules before the agreement is filed
- Every clinical course planned in sequence, close to home in a state where Clarkson's graduate nursing meets requirements
Start your placement plan
Track, city and next clinical course is all we need to begin.