Registered Nurse First Assistant: how many are there, and how many are in private practice?

National totals

What this specialty covers

A perioperative registered nurse who works in collaboration with the surgeon and other health care team members to achieve optimal outcomes. The RNFA has acquired the necessary knowledge, judgment, and skills specific to the expanded role of RNFA clinical practice. Intraoperatively, the RNFA assists the surgeon.

Reading the sole-proprietor share

For this specialty, 1,398 records, or 45.2%, are flagged as sole proprietors. That field is self-reported in NPPES, so it is an imperfect proxy for private practice and may not capture employment, affiliation, billing, or other organizational arrangements. It should be read as an NPI registration characteristic, not a definitive count of independently practicing RNFAs.

By state

New NPI registrations by year

Counts reflect the year each NPI was first issued, among records still active today. The final year is partial: this data covers through 2026-01-11.

Data notes

• The sole-proprietor field is self-reported by the provider in NPPES and is an imperfect proxy for private practice.
• A sole-proprietor count shown as <11 is suppressed: the true value is below 11, which could include zero.
• - The primary-taxonomy count excludes providers who list Registered Nurse First Assistant only as a secondary classification.
• - An active NPI does not establish current clinical activity, workload, or full-time practice.
• Providers are counted once, by their primary taxonomy code only.

Source: CMS National Plan and Provider Enumeration System (NPPES) Data Dissemination file, FOIA-disclosable public data under CMS-6060-N. Aggregated by Hero EMR on 2026-08-03; deactivated NPIs excluded; specialty assigned from the primary taxonomy code (NUCC 25.1). Counts below 11 are suppressed. Individual providers are never published. All provider data pages.

Common questions