Bradley MSN AGACNP: clinical hours, courses and acute care preceptors
Bradley University's online MSN in Adult-Gerontology Acute Care (AGACNP) now carries 750 clinical hours in the 2026-27 catalog, spread over NUR 655 to NUR 658 in acute care settings, plus one on-site skills bootcamp before the final course. You choose each preceptor and hospital, and Bradley approves both. We find acute care NP teams that fit every course and hand you preceptor details that make the packet complete before Bradley's deadline.
Plan your AGACNP practicums
Your entry route, city and next NUR course is enough to start.
The MSN AGACNP at a glance
Bradley offers the acute care master's through two entry routes, both delivered online apart from the bootcamp covered below. Nurses with a BSN complete 47 credits. The RN-entry route, for nurses whose first credential is an ADN, a hospital diploma or a non-nursing bachelor's, runs to 56.5 credits: it opens with three bridge courses (NUR 300, NUR 303, NUR 404) and a 50-hour community placement in NUR 407 before any acute care work.
Only one certifying body appears in the catalog for this track, the ANCC adult-gerontology acute care exam. Passing the NUR 690 exit exam serves as your comprehensive assessment, anything under a B in a NUR course blocks progression, and the degree carries a five-year completion window.
| Route | Catalog credits | Catalog clinical hours | Online page |
|---|---|---|---|
| BSN entry | 47 | 750 | 47 credits, 7 semesters, 600 hours |
| RN entry (ADN, diploma or non-nursing bachelor's) | 56.5 | 750 in the AG courses; NUR 407 carries its own 50 | 56 credits, 9 semesters, 600 hours |
Four practicum courses and where the hours fall
The 2026-27 course descriptions place 750 supervised hours in four courses. The load is back-weighted: 300 of those hours sit in the final course, so the preceptor you secure for NUR 658 needs room for the longest stretch of the program.
| Course | Title | Credits | Hours | Comes after |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| NUR 655 | Diagnostic Reasoning | 3 | 50 | No prerequisite listed |
| NUR 656 | Management of Acutely Ill Adults and Geriatrics I | 6 | 200 | BIO 526, NUR 600, NUR 651 |
| NUR 657 | Management of Acutely Ill Adults and Geriatrics II | 6 | 200 | NUR 656 |
| NUR 658 | Management of Acutely Ill Adults and Geriatrics III | 6 | 300 | NUR 657 and the Nurse Practitioner Skills Bootcamp |
The graduate handbook lists an AGACNP Clinical Packet and Guidelines covering the three management courses, NUR 656 through NUR 658. NUR 655 is missing from that list, so ask its course faculty how the 50 supervised hours are arranged and approved before you book any shifts.
Bradley's public pages also leave open whether each practicum spans the full 15-week semester or a single 7-week term. That detail decides how many shifts a week your preceptor must host, so settle it with your academic advisor before the search begins.
600 or 750 hours: two Bradley sources disagree
The 2026-27 catalog lists 750 hours for every AGACNP option and adds the required on-site skills bootcamp. Bradley's online AGACNP page, refreshed in September 2026, still shows the earlier design: 600 hours at 200 per course, no hours attached to NUR 655, and the line about no campus residency. That earlier version matches the 2025-26 catalog.
Your catalog year and the program of study in MyOnline decide which set applies to you. Until your academic advisor confirms it, size your preceptor search for the larger number, because finding 150 extra acute care hours late in the program is far harder than finishing with room to spare. The history of the change is on our 750-hour change page, and every track's totals sit in the clinical hours planner.
Build your AGACNP plan around 750 hours and the bootcamp until your advisor tells you otherwise.
Who can supervise an AGACNP student
Supervision has to come from a qualified preceptor working in acute care, in the catalog's words. The examples on Bradley's online page are intensive care, emergency, trauma and sub-acute units, and the page leaves the facility up to you, subject to Bradley signing off on it and on the preceptor.
Bradley's fullest public statement on preceptor credentials is a June 2017 webinar aimed at FNP students. It cleared NPs and physicians (MD or DO), ruled out PAs, clinical nurse specialists and clinical nurse leaders, and asked that NPs supervise the majority of hours. Bradley has not said publicly whether the acute care track follows that exact mix, so the AGACNP clinical packet in MyOnline is the document to check. Our preceptor requirements page collects every published rule.
Two current rules reach every track. Bradley's welcome site warns that a license infraction can block a preceptor's approval, and the Graduate Professional Behaviors Policy names two conflicts of interest: a relative serving as your preceptor, and you being paid for practicum work.
The on-site skills bootcamp
Before NUR 658 you must have finished the Nurse Practitioner Skills Bootcamp: the 2026-27 course description lists it as a prerequisite, and the program text describes one on-site skills bootcamp. It applies to every AGACNP route, the DNP and the certificate included.
Where and when the AG version happens is still unannounced. Bradley's October FNP Bootcamp, a two-day event in Peoria, is open to other NP specialties, yet no Bradley page says an AG student meets the requirement there. Ask your advisor which event counts and when it runs, then warn your NUR 657 preceptor about the travel days early. Because the bootcamp sits in the prerequisite chain for your largest practicum, missing it can hold back 300 hours. What little is published sits on our AG skills bootcamp page.
Your state and the acute care column
Bradley's online licensure table gives the acute care track its own column, headed "GERIATRIC - ACUTE". Forty-six states carry a yes for AGACNP. The four no answers belong to California, Maryland, New Hampshire and Tennessee, while New York's footnote bars clinical rotations inside New York for students who live there.
The acute care yes list is longer than it was. Set against a March 2025 capture of the table, eight states flipped to yes in this column: Arizona, Idaho and Washington in the West, Iowa, Missouri and Nebraska closer to Illinois, plus Kentucky and Connecticut. Oregon's acute care cell was already a yes. Bradley expects your rotations in the approved state you applied from or now call home, under an RN license that is active for that state. Each footnote is explained on the state disclosures page.
Hospitals, portals and lead time
Most acute care hours happen inside hospital systems, and many of them layer their own student intake over the agency agreement that Bradley's Office of Online and Distance Education arranges. Advocate, for instance, describes placing Illinois inpatient NP students through myClinicalExchange but expects the school and student to bring the preceptor; when that preceptor is not an Advocate employee, a hospital, school and employer agreement is needed, and Advocate allows up to three months for it.
Northwestern Medicine's north and northwest suburban committee meets monthly, quotes four to eight weeks for a reply, and accepts only schools with a current affiliation agreement. Each of these is that system's own policy, and it can change. Put the hospital's clock next to Bradley's, where the packet is due at the prior semester's midterm, and let the slower one set your start date. The systems are compared on sites with their own processes.
How we place Bradley AGACNP students
Bradley's acute care students choose us because we plan all four practicums as one project from the first conversation. Send your entry route, your city and your next course, and your placement advisor opens the search right away.
What the placement desk delivers
- Preceptors from hospitalist, critical care, emergency, trauma or sub-acute NP teams close to home, in the state Bradley approved for you
- A
NUR 658preceptor confirmed for the full 300 hours, with the bootcamp days built into the schedule - Every item your preceptor supplies for the packet (license, CV, proof of malpractice coverage, the practice address) collected before the DocuSign step
- Hospital portals and three-way agreements flagged at the start, so their lead times fit inside Bradley's midterm deadline
- Backup candidates kept in view, so a mid-course departure leaves your hours on track
Bradley signs off on every preceptor and facility. Our job is the groundwork: a preceptor who fits the rules and a request with nothing missing. Start your AGACNP placement plan today.
Questions Bradley students ask
Could my AGACNP practicum happen at the hospital that employs me?
Nothing Bradley has published addresses a practicum at your own employer. The rule it does state is that practicum work cannot be paid work, so student hours must be separate from any shift on the payroll. Read the AGACNP clinical packet and raise the idea with course faculty before you plan around your own hospital; the workplace practicum page goes further.
Do telehealth encounters count toward AGACNP clinical hours?
Possibly, under rules you will find inside Bradley's systems. For the FNP and both AG tracks, the handbook defers to a separate telemedicine guidance document that Bradley has not made public. Look for it in MyOnline, or ask course faculty, before any video or phone visit goes into Typhon as clinical time.
How far ahead should the search for an AGACNP preceptor begin?
Start from Bradley's cutoff, the midpoint of the semester before the course, and subtract the hospital's own processing time. In 2017 Bradley advised beginning roughly a year out, and hospital agreements that run for months make that advice fit acute care well. Two semesters ahead of NUR 656 is a sensible opening.
Can I log AGACNP hours before the semester starts?
No. Under the handbook, clinical time counts only once the scheduled semester is underway, and every practicum day has a seven-day window for its Typhon entry. A leave of absence pauses hours entirely, and break-time hours with an Incomplete on your record require sign-off from the lead faculty member.
Which certification exam does the MSN AGACNP lead to?
Bradley lists one exam for acute care graduates, ANCC's adult-gerontology acute care certification, in both the catalog and the online page. Graduating makes you eligible to apply; the certifying body and your state board of nursing then make their own decisions, a point the graduate handbook makes as well.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-25
We check these pages against Bradley's own catalog, online program pages and Graduate Student Handbook. Your clinical packet, course faculty and academic advisor have the final word.
Bradley lets you choose your preceptors. We find the ones worth choosing.
Tell us your Bradley track, your city and your next practicum course. We line up preceptors who fit the NUR course and gather the license, CV and malpractice details the DocuSign packet asks for, well before the midterm of the semester before you start.
- Preceptors matched to the course: primary care for FNP and AGPCNP, acute care teams for AGACNP, mental health settings for PMHNP
- Preceptor license, CV, malpractice coverage and the site address ready for the packet
- Every practicum in your sequence planned together, close to home in your approved state
Start your placement plan
Track, city and next practicum is all we need to begin.