NP preceptors in Miami-Dade for FIU students
Miami-Dade is Florida International University's (FIU) home county, where the Modesto A. Maidique Campus sits and where FIU's long-standing clinical area begins. Federal shortage-area records show where primary care demand concentrates, and the county's largest systems publish student rules that run through the school, so a strong search here starts with community practices and a clear reading of each system's own requirements.
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Tell us your FIU program and where you live. A placement advisor replies with the preceptor and site options that fit your FIU course.
What FIU allows in its home county
Dade is one of the four counties FIU names as its long-standing clinical area, with Monroe, Broward and Palm Beach, so a site here raises none of the distance questions that a site elsewhere in Florida can. AGPCNP and PNP students on the online tracks identify the site themselves while FIU's clinical department handles the contract side; on the hybrid FNP, PMHNP and AGACNP tracks the department helps you one-on-one, with the graduate nursing clinical coordinator as your main contact.
Training close to campus has practical value. FIU's graduate nursing offices sit in the AHC 3 building at MMC in Miami, and FIU's MSN FAQ says online-track students may need 1-3 campus visits each semester. A Miami-Dade site keeps those trips short. Proximity changes nothing about the contract, which still comes before day one; the clinical site contracts guide explains how a new one is set up.
Primary care shortage areas across the county
HRSA's files, updated through September 23, 2026, count 39 Miami-Dade records of primary care shortage (Health Professional Shortage Areas, or HPSAs), including both designated records and those proposed for withdrawal. None of them is a geographic HPSA; each is tied to a population or a facility, with scores running from 3 to 21.
| HPSA type | Records | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Low-income population | 22 | 3 designated: Liberty City (score 18), Little Haiti (18), Wynwood Park (14); 19 proposed for withdrawal on 09/22/2025 |
| Federally qualified health center (FQHC) | 10 | Designated |
| Correctional facility | 6 | Designated |
| Tribal or urban Indian health | 1 | Designated |
The population records proposed for withdrawal include Hialeah Gardens, Golden Glades, Naranja, Opa-locka, Southwest Dade, Homestead, West Perrine, Little Havana and Kendale Lakes/The Hammocks. Proposed withdrawal is a status in HRSA's process, so check a specific address in HRSA's shortage-area finder rather than relying on a neighborhood name.
Mental health shortage areas, briefly
The mental health picture is smaller but more settled. HRSA's September 2026 file shows 20 mental health HPSAs in the county, 19 of them designated, with scores from 3 to 23. The single population record is South Florida Behavioral Network - Circuit 11, scored 15; the rest are 10 FQHCs, 8 correctional facilities (one proposed for withdrawal) and a single tribal or urban Indian health record.
For PMHNP students, the FQHC and community behavioral health settings are where those records point, and they are worth a close look when you plan a psychiatric rotation near home. The PMHNP track guide covers who can precept a psychiatric rotation and how placements on that hybrid track are arranged, including the Florida prescribing rules a psychiatric preceptor works under.
What a shortage record tells you, and what it does not
A shortage designation describes need, not an open door. It says a population or facility lacks enough clinicians for its patients; it says nothing about whether that clinic has room, staff time or willingness to teach a student this semester. Treat the records as a map of where primary care work is concentrated, then ask each practice directly.
Two Florida programs connect to these records. The TEACH funding program, created in 2024, can reimburse FQHCs, community mental health centers and similar facilities for clinical hours they host, when funded, which gives some community sites a reason to say yes. And after graduation, Florida APRNs can seek a temporary certificate to practice in an area of critical need, which includes federally funded community health centers; the Board points to HRSA's finder for those areas. The Florida APRN guide covers the licensing side.
Large systems in Miami-Dade and their own rules
Several large systems operate in and around the county, and their public pages speak for themselves. Baptist Health South Florida's page limits rotation requests to schools that hold its Master Agreement and Program Letter of Agreement, wants the preceptor confirmed before the request, and runs onboarding through Complio. At Cleveland Clinic Florida, advanced practice placements go through a school's academic representative, and only after an affiliation agreement is signed. The Florida NP preceptors guide reads both pages closely.
Jackson Health System's nursing site describes its own Jackson Nurse Preceptor program for staff and a one-year post-master's NP certificate offered with the University of Miami, and UHealth's nursing page presents advanced-practice fellowships. Neither page lays out a request route for NP students from other schools. Whether any system site can host your FIU rotation is a question for FIU's clinical department, asked before you promise a clinician a start date.
Working in a Miami-Dade hospital while you study
If you keep a nursing job through the program, the workplace rules follow you into the search. FIU's graduate handbook keeps you off your own unit for rotations, though a separate unit inside a large institution is acceptable. A system can go further: Baptist's page keeps its own staff from logging clinical hours in the facility that employs them.
DNP students face a related rule. Residency hours at your job count only beyond your regular duties and outside scheduled work hours, and your organizational mentor cannot be your regular supervisor. Before proposing any site inside your employer's system, read its student policy as well as FIU's. The working where you work guide goes through each program's version of the rule.
How we search in Miami-Dade
Distance in Miami-Dade is measured in drive time, and weekday primary care rotations run Monday to Friday, roughly 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., under FIU's handbook. We map practices you can reach on clinic days from home or work, then approach independent internal medicine, family, geriatric and pediatric practices, physician groups and community health centers whose patients fit your course.
Each candidate is screened for a Florida license, national certification and time in the specialty, and every practice is checked for an existing FIU agreement before you commit. System sites arrive with a short summary of the system's published requirements. Every Preceptor Request Form field comes to you filled in, and FIU's faculty and clinical education office then give the approval on a request with nothing left to chase. Tell us your neighborhood and practicum term in the form below.
Questions FIU students ask
Which parts of Miami-Dade are primary care shortage areas?
Among population-based records, only Liberty City, Little Haiti and Wynwood Park are still designated in HRSA's September 2026 file; nineteen others, from Hialeah Gardens to Homestead, were proposed for withdrawal in September 2025. The county's FQHC, correctional and tribal or urban Indian health records remain designated.
Can I do FIU clinicals at Jackson Health System?
Jackson's public nursing pages cover its staff preceptor program and a joint UM/Jackson post-master's NP certificate, not a request process for NP students enrolled elsewhere. Ask FIU's clinical department whether a Jackson site can be contracted for your course before you approach anyone there.
Do I have to train in Miami-Dade as an FIU student?
No. Miami-Dade is one of FIU's four home counties, alongside Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe, and students on the online primary care tracks may train beyond all four once a contract is in place. Hybrid-track students raise location with the graduate nursing clinical coordinator.
Are FQHCs good sites for FIU primary care practicums?
They see the patients primary care practicums need, and Florida's TEACH program can reimburse FQHCs for hosting clinical hours when it is funded. Each FQHC still decides for itself whether it can take a student, and FIU approves the site and holds the contract like any other practice.
Is a Miami-Dade site faster to set up than one farther away?
Not automatically. Speed depends on whether an FIU agreement is already on file for the practice. A clinic across the street from campus with no agreement needs the same 6-8 weeks for a new contract, under the current handbook, as a distant one, so the contract check matters more than the mileage.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-26
We check these pages against FIU's own graduate handbook, preceptor manual, plans of study, catalog and licensure pages. Your plan of study, your course faculty, your clinical faculty and FIU's Office of Clinical Education have the final word.
FIU asks you to identify your clinical site. We make that the easy part.
Tell us your FIU track, where you live and which semester your next practicum starts. We find preceptors whose patients fit the course, check early whether the site already holds an FIU contract, and prepare everything the Preceptor Request Form asks for.
- Preceptors matched to the course: adult and older-adult primary care for
NGR 6201L, pediatric primary care forNGR 6301L, an organizational mentor forNGR 7940C - Preceptor, facility, license and schedule details ready for the Preceptor Request Form, weeks ahead of the contract clock
- Across Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe, or beyond them where FIU approves your site
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