Registered Nurse
SOC 29-1141
Registered nurses assess patients, plan and deliver care, administer medication and treatments, and coordinate with the rest of the clinical team. In Florida the licence is issued by the Florida Board of Nursing, and eligibility runs through a Board-approved nursing programme and the NCLEX-RN examination — not through accumulated coursework.
Nurse Practitioner and Advanced Practice Nurse
SOC 29-1171
⚠⚠⚠ Florida grants nurse practitioners autonomous practice — and almost every account of it omits the limit that matters. Autonomous registration covers PRIMARY CARE ONLY. It does not let you practise your specialty without a physician protocol, and only certified midwives are excepted. 11,201 APRNs were registered for autonomous practice as of the 2024 legislative analysis. ⚠⚠ The occupation itself is nearly twice the size of the physician assistant profession — 320,400 employed, 29,500 openings a year, $132,300 median.