NUR 686: the 250-hour core of Bradley's PMHNP sequence
NUR 686 PMHNP Continuum of Care Across the Lifespan and Practicum II is the largest single block in Bradley University's PMHNP clinical plan: 250 practicum hours, one third of the 750, with a clinical preceptor in psychiatric care. Three decisions shape it: whether to stay with your NUR 685 preceptor, how to pace 250 hours, and how soon to start on the sub-specialty site for NUR 687.
Get your placement plan
Tell us your Bradley program and where you live. A placement advisor replies with the preceptor and site options that fit your course.
What NUR 686 covers
The 2026-27 catalog gives NUR 686 6 credits and 250 practicum hours, continuing the acute and chronic psychiatric care of NUR 685, its only listed prerequisite. Supervision works as before: a qualified psychiatric preceptor, cleared by Bradley before a single hour counts.
Sitting between the first practicum and the sub-specialty course, NUR 686 gives general psychiatric skills their longest run. A longer stretch with one caseload lets you follow patients across weeks, see medication changes play out and take on more of each visit yourself.
The handbook's PMHNP Clinical Packet and Guidelines covers NUR 686 together with the other three PMHNP courses, and the current version lives in MyOnline. Read its NUR 686 section before you ask a preceptor to commit to 250 hours.
| Course | Hours | Setting in the 2026-27 catalog |
|---|---|---|
| NUR 685 | 200 | Acute and chronic psychiatric care |
| NUR 686 | 250 | Acute and chronic psychiatric care |
| NUR 687 | 150 | A sub-specialty, such as forensics or consult liaison |
Stay with your NUR 685 preceptor, or switch
Bradley points both ways. Its online hub pages for the MSN, DNP and certificates recommend new supervision as your clinical focus changes. Yet in 2017 its webinar let students reuse a preceptor, though only twice, by resubmitting a single-page form and replacing any expired credentials.
That webinar predates the PMHNP program, which launched in fall 2021, so check the current PMHNP packet before you plan around reuse. If both routes are open, weigh them this way:
- Staying keeps a preceptor who already knows your skills, and the paperwork is lighter.
- Switching widens your range: an inpatient unit after an outpatient clinic, or a community program after a private practice.
- A preceptor who can take you for both courses removes one search from a crowded semester.
- A new site earns its place when the first one sees a narrow slice of patients.
Either way, the approval runs through Bradley again, so the timing on the preceptor packet page still applies.
Pacing 250 hours
Across a 15-week semester, 250 hours averages about 17 a week; inside one 7-week term it climbs to roughly 36. Either way, the hours cannot begin before the semester does, and each practicum day belongs in Typhon within seven days, with the patient data NP students record.
If life intervenes, nursing's own Incomplete rules are tighter than the university's. Four-fifths of the coursework must already be done at B level or better, the leftover work closes out no later than the eleventh week of the next semester, and any hours logged over a break need sign-off from the lead faculty member.
An Incomplete in NUR 686 can also hold up NUR 687, which lists it as a prerequisite, so fix a slow pace in the first half of the term. Our behind on clinical hours page covers the practical moves.
Why the NUR 687 search starts during NUR 686
NUR 687 is a sub-specialty practicum with the same half-a-semester-ahead packet date as every other course. Taken back to back, that date lands mid-way through NUR 686, so the harder search runs alongside your heaviest clinical load.
Several of the sub-specialties Bradley names, consult liaison above all, live inside hospitals whose systems add their own intake. Advocate Health Care, for one, allows as long as three months for the extra contract it requires with an outside preceptor's employer. Our page on sites with their own processes gathers what each system says.
Settle your sub-specialty choice early in NUR 686, then give the search the weeks it needs. The NUR 687 page covers the options the catalog names.
If you move or change jobs mid-sequence
The handbook keeps your practicums in the approved state tied to your admission or your home. A move to an unapproved state, or a plan to train just over a state line, has to reach your advisor or the department chair before the next semester opens, and the site's state may require its own RN license from you.
For PMHNP, Bradley's disclosure table answers yes for 46 states and no for Tennessee, New Hampshire, Maryland and California, with a separate bar on clinical work inside New York for New York students. Read the state disclosures page before you sign a lease somewhere new mid-program.
A new job inside your approved state is simpler, but it can still cost you a preceptor if your schedules stop overlapping. Raise it with the preceptor and course faculty the week it happens.
What we handle while you log NUR 686 hours
We treat NUR 686 as a two-track semester. On the first track, we support the course you are in: confirming whether your NUR 685 preceptor can continue, or finding a new site that adds range, with the packet details gathered well ahead of Bradley's midterm date.
On the second, we are already hunting for the NUR 687 site, contacting nearby programs in the niche you picked and learning each one's intake rules. You keep your attention on patients while we keep the next placement moving.
If a preceptor steps away during this long course, we start on a replacement as soon as you tell us, so your 250 hours keep moving. See our process for the full sequence, or use the form below.
Questions Bradley students ask
How many hours is NUR 686 at Bradley?
The 2026-27 catalog lists 250 practicum hours for NUR 686, for 6 credits. That is the largest share of the 750 PMHNP clinical hours, coming after 150 in NUR 684 and 200 in NUR 685, and before the 150-hour sub-specialty course, NUR 687.
Do I submit a new packet if my preceptor stays the same?
Bradley approves each practicum separately. In the 2017 webinar, reusing a preceptor meant resending the one-page initial preceptor form, plus updated license, CV or malpractice documents if the originals had lapsed. The current PMHNP clinical packet in MyOnline sets today's rule, so check it before the midterm deadline.
Can telehealth visits count toward NUR 686 hours?
The handbook's telemedicine note names the FNP and two AG tracks, not PMHNP, and the guidance it refers to is not public. Psychiatric care is often delivered by video, so this matters: get your NUR 686 course faculty's answer before building part of your schedule around virtual visits.
Can I split NUR 686 hours across two sites?
Nothing Bradley has posted covers dividing a course between two sites. Since every preceptor and facility needs approval before hours count, a second site brings a second packet and perhaps another agency agreement. If one site cannot offer all 250 hours, raise the idea with course faculty early.
Is NUR 686 the same in the BSN-to-DNP PMHNP?
Yes. The doctoral PMHNP runs the identical four-course psychiatric sequence and then the four DNP project courses. Its catalog page counts the 750 specialty hours plus project time toward a 1,000-hour floor, so NUR 686 matters just as much there; our DNP-PMHNP page covers the full plan.
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 University 2026-27 catalog: NUR course descriptions
- Bradley University Department of Nursing Graduate Student Handbook (revised 5/8/2026)
- Bradley University graduate nursing course extension and Incomplete policy
- Bradley University Online: Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner
- Bradley University state disclosures
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.