Should Physicians Train Specialty Nurse Practitioners?

Nurse practitioners (NPs) have long been associated with primary care. Primary care is the focus of the majority of our training, and the majority of NPs deliver primary care in their clinical practices. I was no different. But just over 20 years ago, when the need arose to expand the primary care practice where I was working to include treatment for chronic hepatitis C, our division chief asked if I would develop a clinical program to address that need. As an academic medical practice, he felt that the patients we were targeting required more continuity than could be offered by medical residents with rotating schedules. And so I designed a clinical program, sought out training opportunities for myself, and built what has become an enduring clinical program. Other NPs I know have taken their experience as registered nurses and then, after becoming NPs, leveraged those 2 assets into high-value NP roles in a wide variety of clinical specialties. These days, NPs are found in nearly every clinical specialty, many in roles they created, most working in multidisciplinary groups. I think we are there to stay. I don’t know of any data that reveal how the majority of specialty NPs are trained, but my hunch is that most have had significant training and mentorship from physicians. Should this be the case?