What Is Nurse Practitioner Mentor (and Where Do You Start)?

Hi, I'm Allison Sowders, FNP-C, the family nurse practitioner behind Nurse Practitioner Mentor. If you are a new NP in primary care and you feel overwhelmed, second-guessing your decisions, and wishing someone would just show you how to think through a visit, this is for you.

Why I built this

NP school teaches you the medicine. It does not teach you how to run a real 15-minute primary care visit. I felt that gap hard my first year: stressful, exciting, and isolating all at once.

I see the same gap in my own clinic. Family practice residents get three years of training with preceptors, doing the same job we do as NPs. No wonder so many of us feel behind at the start. I was lucky to spend a year in that residency as an NP fellow, and it changed how I practice. I built Nurse Practitioner Mentor to hand you that same way of thinking, without the years it took me.

A little about me

• 4 years as an RN in the emergency department
• MSN, University of Cincinnati, 2019
• Family practice NP since 2019, still seeing patients today

Outside the clinic, I'm a wife and mom to three little ones, so I know what it is like to build confidence at work while keeping things together at home. The goal is both: steadier in clinic, and not carrying every patient home with you.

Where to start

Everything I teach comes down to one thing: a clear, repeatable way to think through the visit so the decisions come faster and you trust them. Here is how to start, depending on where you are.

Start here: the Clinical Desk Reference ($37)

A fast clinical reference for the 12 topics you reach for most in primary care. One double-sided page per topic: the decision, what to say, and what to chart, ready the second you need it during a visit. It is the lowest-cost, fastest way in. Get the Clinical Desk Reference.

Go all in: the Primary Care Clinical Mastery Program ($997)

When you want the complete system, this is it. The full clinical decision-making framework across the labs and conditions you see every week, with 13.5 AANP-accredited CE hours (2.4 pharmacology). Most employers reimburse the CE, and there is a reimbursement template inside to make it easy. See the Primary Care Clinical Mastery Program.

What I want for you

Within a few months, I want you walking into visits with a plan instead of a pit in your stomach, making the call and moving on, and finishing your notes closer to on time. You do not have to figure this out alone. Let's build your confidence together.

Frequently asked questions

Who is Nurse Practitioner Mentor for?
New and early-career nurse practitioners in primary care. It can help urgent care too, but the focus is the primary care visit.

Where should I start?
The $37 Clinical Desk Reference is the fastest, lowest-cost start. When you want the full CE-accredited system, that is the Primary Care Clinical Mastery Program.

Who teaches it?
Allison Sowders, FNP-C, a family nurse practitioner working in primary care since 2019, with an emergency department RN background.

Written by Allison Sowders, MSN, APRN, FNP-BC, a practicing primary care nurse practitioner and founder of Nurse Practitioner Mentor. Reviewed July 2026.