Family Nurse Practitioner, DNP

Nurse helping a patient.

Now accepting applications for Fall 2025

Application Deadline: May 1, 2025

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Program Overview

The Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP) specialty track prepares the student to provide primary healthcare across the lifespan. Our innovative program ensures that you have a strong foundation in evidence-based practice and holistic wellness and prevention while ensuring the skills to provide treatment for both acute and chronic health conditions.

FNP's job opportunities are the most flexible- ranging from pediatric practices to skilled nursing centers. In addition, the scope of employment opportunities includes hospitalists, cardiology, orthopedics, and other specialties.

Track Highlights

  • Education in healthcare across the lifespan from infant to elderly. This range of experience will include well-child and well-adult care to management of acute and chronic medical conditions.
  • Holistic, integrated approach to treating and managing the care of all age groups is the focus of our plans of study.
  • Our curriculum offers specialized training during the on-campus learning intensives in care skills such as long-acting reversible contraception insertion, internal examinations, basic suturing, and intrauterine device insertion.
  • The integrated curriculum with an interprofessional learning environment enables you to learn about a variety of different disciplines and specialty areas such as telemedicine, primary care, palliative care, and substance use disorders.
  • Three education courses are available for a total of 9 credits may be added to your plan of study. Completion of these courses provides qualification for the Certified Nurse Educator Exam.

Family NP Clinical Experience

  • FNP students are required to complete clinical hours at approved sites that have a focus on primary care.
  • Student Services staff will add support in finding clinical placements whether you live in South Carolina or out of state. While it is ultimately up to the student to find clinical placement, we have a large network of providers and are happy to assist, when possible, in finding placement.
  • A portion of your clinical time may be spent in alternative sites, learning about in-patient care, urgent care and specialty care.

FAQs

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Meet Your Lead Faculty, Dr. Elizabeth Harmon

Elizabeth Harmon Headshot

Elizabeth Harmon
DNP, APRN, FNP-BC, CNE
Assistant Professor, FNP Lead Faculty
harmoned@musc.edu

Dr. Elizabeth Harmon is an Assistant Professor in the College of Nursing Doctor of Nursing Practice Program. She received her BSN from Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 1978 and both her MSN and DNP from The Medical University of South Carolina, in 2001 and 2013 respectively. In addition, in 2019 she attained her Certified Nurse Educator status. She has been a certified Family Nurse Practitioner since 2001.

Dr. Harmon is a first-generation college graduate from a western Pennsylvania mill-town. As a registered nurse, Dr. Harmon worked in many nursing disciplines within a hospital setting including general duty, cardiac and surgical intensive cares and supervisory positions.

After a lengthy career working at the bedside/hospital nurse, she furthered her education with an interest in primary care throughout the lifespan. During her graduate program she received the Rural Health Fellowship allowing her to focus on healthcare disparities and barriers to primary health care. Her doctoral project addressed shared-decision making in the primary care setting to improve health care outcomes.

Dr. Harmon initially joined MUSC as clinical faculty in 2003 and as instructor in 2013. Her experience of clinical practice provides a strong foundation for her role in preparing the next generation of advanced practice registered nurses.

Achievement is "something accomplished, especially by superior ability, special effort, great courage." My passion and focus is for each of our students to successfully achieve their goal of becoming a competent and compassionate Family Nurse Practitioner.

I will come beside you as a guide, while you put forth with great courage, the special effort needed to successfully complete this doctoral program.