Telehealth hours at NKU: ask before you count

None of NKU's public clinical pages, from the preceptor requirements to the online FAQ, says how telehealth hours are treated. NKU Online has run an article about telepsychiatry, but it describes the field and sets no policy for students. Any course-level guidance would sit in your syllabus or your Canvas clinical shell.

The rules NKU does publish still apply to every rotation. Your preceptor has to be employed at the practicum site and located in a state NKU approves. Your hours go into Medatrax and your preceptor verifies them weekly. NKU's 2023 preceptor checklist also has the preceptor meet "face-to-face via technology with the student and faculty", which is an oversight meeting about goals and progress rather than patient care.

A 7-week session leaves little room to replace hours that turn out not to count. NKU plans each rotation around roughly 125 to 150 hours, so discovering in week six that a block of video visits will not be accepted can leave a gap there is no time to fill.

Medatrax adds a second reason. Once your preceptor verifies an entry, it locks, so an hour logged the wrong way is awkward to correct later. Asking first costs one email; guessing can cost a session. That is why the question belongs at the start of each rotation, alongside the schedule and the site, not halfway through it. Our NKU clinical hour logs page explains verification.

Send these before the rotation starts, and keep the reply. Your Clinical Instructor is listed in myNKU under Class Schedule.

• Do telehealth or video visits count toward this course's clinical hours?
• If they do, is there a share or number of hours I should stay within?
• Must my preceptor and I be in the same location during virtual visits?
• Does the patient's location matter, for example a patient in a state NKU does not approve?
• How should virtual hours be labeled when I log them in Medatrax?
• Does the answer change for later courses in my sequence?

If the reply leaves a point open, ask a follow-up before your first virtual visit rather than after it.

Psychiatric practices often mix office and video visits, so PMHNP students meet the question most. NKU recommends PMHNP hours across pediatric, adult and geriatric patients, and a hybrid practice can help with that spread if the virtual portion counts. FNP primary care offices may offer some video visits too, while AGACNP rotations in acute care hospitals are hands-on by nature.

Nursing Education and Nurse Executive Leadership are different again. Educator and leadership work includes meetings, planning and teaching that may happen online, and NKU describes Nurse Executive Leadership activity as shadowing, meetings or a mini-capstone project. Ask how virtual parts of that work should be logged. Track pages such as NKU PMHNP and NKU FNP cover each program's clinicals.

Once your Clinical Instructor answers, save the email and forward the relevant part to your preceptor. A preceptor who knows how NKU wants virtual time handled can schedule you for the right mix of days and sign off your log with confidence. If your preceptor has questions, point them to your Clinical Instructor directly rather than relaying answers secondhand.

Ask again each session. Each clinical course has its own Clinical Instructor and objectives, and an answer for one course may not carry to the next. Keeping a short file of these replies alongside your Medatrax log gives you a tidy paper trail for the end of the program, when you request hour letters or certification forms.

We place NKU students with preceptors at sites that meet NKU's rules, and when a practice mixes in-person and video visits, a placement advisor tells you before you commit. That lets you put the question to your Clinical Instructor with weeks to spare.

Our default is a schedule built around in-person clinic days that cover your course hours on their own, so your total stands whatever the answer on virtual time. If your instructor confirms that virtual visits count, the hybrid days become extra room rather than a risk. Either way, you and your preceptor know the plan before your first day. Start with how it works or send your course details through the form below.