2024-2025 Catalog 
    
    Oct 06, 2024  
2024-2025 Catalog

Health Systems Leadership, DNP


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The Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) degree program at the University of San Francisco is designed for the baccalaureate-prepared and master’s-prepared nurse. The DNP degree program will prepare graduates for advanced nursing practice in “direct” and “indirect” roles. The program is designed to conform to the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) standard that advanced nursing practice specialty preparation should be at the DNP level (DNP Fact Sheet). In addition, the DNP program will meet the AACN Essentials: Core Competencies for Professional Nursing Education (2021). There are several specialty concentrations in the DNP Program available.

Program Learning Outcomes


Upon completion of the DNP program:

  • The learner will integrate, translate, and apply established and evolving disciplinary nursing knowledge and ways of knowing, as well as knowledge from other disciplines, including a foundation in liberal arts and natural and social sciences to form the basis for clinical judgment and innovation in nursing practice and the practice of professional nursing.
  • The learner will practice holistic, individualized, just, respectful, compassionate, coordinated, evidence- based, and developmentally appropriate person-centered care focused on the individual within multiple complicated contexts, including family and/or important others.
  • The learner will participate in collaborative activities with both traditional and non-traditional partnerships from affected communities, public health, industry, academia, health care, local government entities, and others for the improvement of equitable population health.
  • The learner will generate, synthesize, translate, apply, and disseminate nursing knowledge to improve health and transform health care.
  • The learner will employ established and emerging principles of safety and improvement science as core values of nursing practice and enhance quality and minimize risk of harm to patients and providers through both system effectiveness and individual performance.
  • The learner will demonstrate Intentional collaboration across professions and with care team members, patients, families, communities, and other stakeholders to optimize care, enhance the healthcare experience, and strengthen outcomes.
  • The learner will effectively and proactively coordinate resources to provide safe, quality, equitable care to diverse populations, leading within complex systems of health care.
  • The learner will demonstrate the use of information and communication technologies and informatics processes to provide care, gather data, form information to drive decision making, and support professionals as they expand knowledge and wisdom for practice and improve the delivery of safe, high-quality, and efficient healthcare services.
  • The learner will form and cultivate a sustainable professional nursing identity, accountability, perspective, collaborative disposition, and comportment that reflects nursing’s characteristics and values.
  • The learner will participate in activities and self-reflection that foster personal health, resilience, and well-being, lifelong learning, and support the acquisition of nursing expertise and assertion of leadership.

Major Requirements


Health Systems Leadership, DNP Concentrations


Students must choose one of the following three concentrations. Each concentration requires the HSL DNP Core Courses and practica, plus its own requirements.

Education and Simulation Concentration (18 units)


The Health Systems Leadership (HSL) DNP Specialty Concentration in Education and Simulation requires the core Health Systems Leadership DNP courses, practica, plus 18 units, 9 of which are taken with the USF School of Education:

Management Concentration (14 units)


The Management Concentration requires the Health Systems Leadership DNP core courses, practica, plus 14 units of courses taken online with the USF School of Management:

Population Health Leadership Concentration (8 units)


The Population Health Leadership Concentration requires the Health Systems Leadership DNP core courses, practica, plus these 8 units:

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