NP preceptors in Crowley, New Iberia, Opelousas and the rest of Acadiana
Outside Lafayette Parish, Acadiana's six other parishes hold Ochsner's rural hospitals, two independent hospital systems with no student page, dozens of health center and rural clinic sites, and shortage-area designations in every parish. For a student living in Crowley, Eunice, New Iberia, Opelousas, Breaux Bridge, Abbeville or Kaplan, the right preceptor is often closer than Lafayette. We search the parishes around your home first.
Find a preceptor near you
Tell us your parish and your course.
Acadiana beyond Lafayette Parish
Louisiana's health department groups seven parishes into Region 4: Lafayette plus Acadia, Evangeline, Iberia, St. Landry, St. Martin and Vermilion. Together they held an estimated 603,349 people in 2025, up 1.7% from 2020. Acadia, St. Martin and Vermilion belong to the Lafayette metro, while Evangeline, Iberia and St. Landry carry the USDA's nonmetro classification.
That split shapes a clinical search. The metro parishes sit close enough to Lafayette that a commute into the city is one option among several. In the nonmetro parishes, the practices in your own town and the next one over are usually the realistic field, and a smaller field means each qualified preceptor counts for more. The city itself has its own guide, NP preceptors in Lafayette.
Ochsner's rural hospitals follow the Lafayette rules
Three Ochsner Lafayette General campuses sit outside the city: Ochsner Acadia General in Crowley, Ochsner Abrom Kaplan Memorial in Kaplan and Ochsner St. Martin in Breaux Bridge. Ochsner keeps a list of hospitals that need their own separate agreements, and no Acadiana hospital appears on it. These rural campuses therefore run on the same InPlace process as the Lafayette medical center.
In practice that means a school representative submits every request, a new school agreement needs at least four months, and students are asked not to approach Ochsner providers directly. If you already know a nurse practitioner at the Crowley or Kaplan campus, that name travels through your school coordinator, as Ochsner directs.
Opelousas General, Iberia Medical Center and other independents
Opelousas General Health System, with its main and south campuses in Opelousas, posts no page for nurse practitioner or nursing students. The only student item on its site is a 2022 post welcoming third-year medical students. Iberia Medical Center in New Iberia has no student page anywhere on its website either.
Silence on a website is not a refusal. It means each hospital decides case by case, and the decision starts with an agency contract between the school and the hospital, which the ICMSN requires on file before any clinical day. Your course faculty know which contracts already exist. Meanwhile, the clinics and independent offices in these towns deserve as much attention as the hospitals themselves.
Health centers and rural health clinics
Community health centers are some of the most important primary care sites in the region. HRSA's file lists 24 active health center sites across Acadiana:
| Network | Active sites |
|---|---|
| Iberia Comprehensive Community Health Center | 10 |
| Southwest Louisiana Primary Health Care Center | 9 |
| Acadiana CARES | 2 |
| SWLA Center for Health Services | 2 |
| HAART | 1 |
Rural health clinics with their own facility shortage designations
- Evangeline Parish: 4
- St. Landry Parish: 6
- Vermilion Parish: 5
Small clinics raise one practical point. When a single nurse practitioner is the only possible preceptor at a site, Louisiana's two-student limit decides whether the site is open: if that NP already supervises two graduate students, the clinic is full for the term. Each network also sets its own student terms, which we confirm before anything else. The Board's full preceptor standards are on the preceptor requirements page.
Shortage-area designations, parish by parish
Every Acadiana parish carries a parish-wide primary care Health Professional Shortage Area and a parish-wide mental health one. HRSA scores run from 0 to 25, with higher scores meaning greater need. Four parishes (Acadia, Evangeline, Iberia and St. Landry) hold the high-needs geographic designation for mental health, the category that covers everyone in the parish rather than a low-income group.
| Parish | Primary care: type, score | Mental health: type, score |
|---|---|---|
| Acadia | Low-income population, 15 | High-needs geographic, 19 |
| Evangeline | Low-income population, 13 | High-needs geographic, 20 |
| Iberia | Low-income population, 15 | High-needs geographic, 20 |
| St. Landry | Low-income population, 13 | High-needs geographic, 17 |
| St. Martin | Low-income population, 18 | Geographic, 18 |
| Vermilion | Low-income population, 16 | Low-income population, 19 |
These designations describe patient access to care, not a count of nurse practitioners. They tell you where need is concentrated, which is useful when you want a busy, varied caseload.
Driving distance is part of the match
A nurse practitioner practicum stretches over many clinical days, and every one of them includes the drive. A commute that feels easy once becomes a real cost in fuel, time and fatigue by the end of a semester, especially when your clinical days fall around a nursing job. We weigh the drive as seriously as the preceptor's credentials.
The best match balances three things: how close the site is to home, whether its caseload fits the course (a NURS 582 placement needs children, adolescents and childbearing women, which not every rural adult practice sees), and whether the preceptor's schedule lines up with yours. Sometimes that points to a clinic in your own town and sometimes to Lafayette. The FNP practicums page lays out what each family course covers.
Why Acadiana students choose us
Whether or not UL Lafayette takes a hand in your placement, we bring you a preceptor and site that already fit its rules. We map the practices in your parish and the neighboring ones, check every nurse practitioner's Louisiana license, population certification and current student load, respect each hospital system's published route, and assemble the preceptor's CV, the site details and the letter of agreement well before your term. If a preceptor drops out, we start again the same week. How it works shows each step.
Questions UL Lafayette students ask
Which Acadiana parishes are health professional shortage areas?
All seven. Acadia, Evangeline, Iberia, Lafayette, St. Landry, St. Martin and Vermilion each carry a primary care designation and a mental health designation from HRSA. Four of the six outside Lafayette hold the high-needs geographic mental health category, and rural health clinics in Evangeline, St. Landry and Vermilion carry facility designations of their own.
Do Ochsner's hospitals in Crowley, Kaplan and Breaux Bridge have their own student process?
No separate one is published. None of Ochsner's Acadiana hospitals appears on its list of sites that need a separate agreement, so requests for Ochsner Acadia General, Ochsner Abrom Kaplan Memorial and Ochsner St. Martin go through the same InPlace process as Lafayette: school-submitted, with at least four months for a new agreement.
Can I do my FNP or PMHNP clinicals at a rural health clinic?
Yes, when the clinic and preceptor meet the rules. The preceptor needs an active Louisiana license, most of your hours must be with an APRN certified in your population focus, and the clinic signs an agency contract with the school before your first day. A rural clinic can be an excellent site if its caseload fits your course.
Do Opelousas General or Iberia Medical Center take NP students?
Neither publishes a process for nurse practitioner students, so there is no public answer. A rotation at either would start with an agency contract between the school and the hospital. Course faculty can tell you whether one is in place; meanwhile, clinics and independent offices in Opelousas and New Iberia remain strong options.
Is it worth driving to Lafayette for a preceptor?
Sometimes. If Lafayette offers the caseload your course needs and nothing closer does, the drive can be worth it. If a qualified preceptor practices in your own parish, the hours you save over a semester usually matter more. We compare both before recommending one, and the cost page explains what shapes a quote.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-27
We check these pages against UL Lafayette's 2026-27 catalog, its online program and state authorization pages, the ICMSN student handbook and Louisiana's nursing rules. Your course faculty and your plan of study have the final word.
Whether UL Lafayette helps or you start alone, we find the preceptor.
Tell us your UL Lafayette program, the practicum coming up and the Louisiana town you train near. We look for preceptors and sites that fit the course and gather the license, CV and agency details that must be on file before your first clinical day.
- Preceptors who meet Louisiana's rules: an active Louisiana license, most hours with an APRN in your population focus
- The preceptor's CV, the agency details and your letter of agreement items gathered early
- Across Acadiana and the rest of Louisiana, plus DNP residencies in your home state
Start your placement plan
Your program, your town and your next clinical semester is all we need to begin.