Nursing (NURS) 528

Overview

NURS 528: NP Older Adult Health is part of the Master of Nursing: Nurse Practitioner (MN-NP) degree and the Post-Masters Diploma: Nurse Practitioner (PMD-NP) program.

In NURS 528, you will learn to provide health care to older adults including the management of common acute and chronic conditions, and the assessment and management of conditions unique to the older adult including polypharmacy and deprescribing.

Outline

NURS 528 is a paced course delivered over 13 weeks using a blended learning approach that combines asynchronous online learning and regular synchronous virtual sessions.

Course content focuses on the development of competencies required for the assessment and management of older adult health conditions. Emphasis is placed on the following:

• Comprehensive assessment of older adults, including functional status, cognitive and mental health screening, and safety considerations

• Clinical reasoning and evidence-informed management of acute and chronic health conditions
• Management of complexity in older adults, including multimorbidity, frailty, and polypharmacy
• Social, cultural, and contextual factors influencing health and care
• Ethical, safety, and system considerations in older adult care

Learning outcomes

1. Establish the reasons for the client encounter to determine the nature of the services required by the client;
2. Integrate clinical reasoning and diagnostic process to formulate differential and final diagnoses;
3. Synthesize assessment findings, including relevant functional health patterns such as fall risk, driving ability, cognitive screening, sensory function, mental health and substance abuse screening, into the care plan;
4. Discuss issues particular to older adult care including life transitions, caregiving roles, elder abuse, frailty, end-of-life care, long-term care, iatrogenesis, poverty and isolation, pharmacodynamics and polypharmacy, geriatric emergencies, and health education and literacy;
5. Identify social and cultural factors influencing the care of older adults in Canada to support culturally sensitive practice; and
6. Demonstrate evidence-based management of health concerns in older adults by providing clinical care to well older adults and those with acute and chronic health conditions, at a level appropriate to a beginning nurse practitioner, including assessment, clinical decision making, diagnostic testing, prescribing, documentation, and follow-up.

Evaluation

Assessment in NURS 528 consists of multiple course activities with assigned percentage weightings. Your final grade is based on overall performance across all required assessments. A variety of assessment approaches are used to evaluate achievement of the course learning outcomes.

Materials

Digital course materials

Links to the following course materials will be made available in the course:

Warshaw, G. A., Potter, J. F., Flaherty, E., Heflin, M. T., McNabney, M. K., & Ham, R. J. (Eds.). (2022). Ham’s primary care geriatrics. A case-based approach (7th ed.). Elsevier. ISBN: 978-0323721684

Recommended resources

Cash, J. C., Fraser, D., Corcoran, L., & Edwards, M. (2025).  Canadian family practice guidelines (2nd ed.). Springer Publishing. ISBN: 978-0826192257

Rao, L. V., & Snyder, L. M. (2020). Wallach's interpretation of diagnostic tests (11^th ed.). Wolters Kluwer. ISBN: 978-1975105587

(Recommended texts not provided within the course).

Important links

• Student services in FHD
• Support services at AU
• Faculty of Graduate Studies
• Faculty of Health Disciplines
• Graduate Calendar