National Practices Regarding Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Projects.

Abstract

AACN published a clarifying document in 2015 to guide Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) programs' DNP Scholarly Projects. This publication provided specific and general guidance; however, areas of inconsistent interpretation remained. The variability of best practices for DNP projects sparked the idea for a national survey to explore how projects are being carried out and to determine if the varied approaches align with AACN's 2015 recommendations. This nationwide study's purpose was to describe DNP Scholarly Project processes and to determine alignment with AACN's 2015 DNP project recommendations. A descriptive survey was deployed to DNP programs across the country. National DNP project practices were identified as well as gaps in alignment with AACN recommendations. The results of this study provided a national snapshot of how DNP programs are executing DNP projects. Rich dialogue and ongoing exploration about DNP project best practices continue because of this work.