Diploma of Practical Nursing

Sheridan’s Practical Nursing program is your first step to becoming a Registered Practical Nurse in Ontario.

Approved by the College of Nurses of Ontario

Sheridan's four-semester Practical Nursing diploma program is approved (Category 1) by the College of Nurses of Ontario (CNO). When you graduate from this program, you'll be eligible to apply to take the Canadian Practical Nursing Registration Examination (CPNRE). When you’ve successfully completed the CPNRE, you’ll be issued a license to practice as a Registered Practical Nurse in Ontario.

Prepare for a career as a practical nurse

In this program, you’ll learn to:

• Help clients with nutrition, elimination, medication, safety, ambulation and hygiene.

• Chart patients’ progress and assess their conditions.

• Care for wounds, change dressings and give medication.

• Educate clients and promote health and wellbeing.

• Care for patients through all stages of a disease, including palliative care.

Clinical placements: Get hands-on experience

Hands-on experience is essential to prepare you for a career as a practical nurse. In this program, you’ll have clinical placements in long-term care facilities, acute and chronic care hospitals and more — starting in your first semester. In your final semester, you’ll participate in a 450-hour clinical placement, gaining on-the-job experience that will boost your resume and build your confidence.

Your placements will be within 150 kilometres of Sheridan College. You’ll need to provide your own transportation to your clinical placements.

State-of-the-art education

Our Nursing Lab is modelled after a real hospital ward. It comes complete with high- and low-fidelity simulation mannequins that can be programmed to display various symptoms. In the lab, you’ll become better prepared to handle real-life situations.

You’ll learn from highly qualified Registered Nurses and Nurse Practitioners. Our professors have extensive specialized experience in family care, maternity care, emergency response, mental health, medical intervention and long-term care.

Complete your Practical Nursing diploma sooner

If you’re interested in fast-tracking your studies, you can choose to complete all four semesters back-to-back. This will allow you to earn your Practical Nursing diploma in just 16 months.

Explore your future lab

In Practical Nursing at Sheridan, you'll work in classrooms and labs designed to imitate real-world workplaces. 

Learning Outcomes

The graduate has reliably demonstrated the ability to:

• Communicate therapeutically with clients and members of the health care team.

• Assess clients across the life span, in a systematic and holistic manner.

• Plan safe and competent nursing care, based upon a thorough analysis of available data and evidence-informed practice guidelines.

• Select and perform nursing interventions using clinical judgment, in collaboration with the client and, where appropriate, the health care team, that promote health and well-being, prevent disease and injury, maintain and/or restore health, promote rehabilitation, and/or provide palliation.

• Evaluate the outcomes resulting from all interventions in the nurse-client interaction and modify the plan of care as required.

• Act equitably and justly with clients and members of the health care team.

• Adapt to a variety of health care settings, using different leadership skills and styles as appropriate to each setting.

• Contribute to creating a healthy and safe work environment in a variety of health care settings.

• Practise in a self-regulated, professional and ethical manner, complying with relevant legislation and with the standards of both the regulatory body and the practice.