Riverside, Corona, Moreno Valley and Temecula: NP clinicals for Azusa Pacific students

Western Riverside County at a glance

About 1.69 million people lived in the 18 western Riverside County cities on January 1, 2026, out of roughly 2.51 million countywide, a total that also takes in the Coachella Valley. Riverside leads with 321,884 residents, then Moreno Valley (211,365), Corona (159,309), Menifee (117,847), Temecula (113,618) and Murrieta (112,315).

APU does have a campus here, though not for nursing: the Murrieta Regional Campus on Murrieta Hot Springs Road lists no nursing programs. For nursing, the nearest APU location is San Bernardino's Inland Empire Regional Campus, about 10 straight-line miles from Riverside and Moreno Valley and about 40 from Temecula.

Riverside students can keep campus, hospital and clinic in one short loop; Temecula and Murrieta students live nearer the two southern hospitals than the campus.

RUHS publishes its NP-student departments

Riverside University Health System is the county's own system, with its medical center in Moreno Valley and a network of community health centers. Its nurse practitioner student page names the departments offering NP preceptorships: internal medicine, family medicine, geriatrics, the NICU and the SICU, the first three lining up best with APU's primary care tracks. Psychiatry is open only to employees of one RUHS campus. Applications go through Clinician Nexus.

RUHS's page does not name APU, and its portal runs alongside APU's process rather than replacing it: the organization still needs an affiliation agreement with APU, you still file a request form, and you still wait for written clearance. Raise RUHS with APU's placement team before you apply so both tracks move together.

Kaiser, Loma Linda and the other hospitals

Kaiser Permanente is the one below with a published student process for Southern California, and nothing in it names APU.

If you work at one of these hospitals, APU's own-employer conditions apply as well; the preceptor requirements page spells them out.

Eighty-five health center sites

HRSA's file shows 85 active FQHC and look-alike locations spread over western Riverside County's cities, run by 16 organizations. Neighborhood Healthcare runs 24, followed by the County of Riverside (14), Centro Medico Community Clinic (9), SAC Health System (6), and Community Health Systems, Inc. and DAP Health with five each. Centro Medico in Corona and Community Health Systems in Moreno Valley also hold facility shortage designations.

Neighborhood Healthcare stands out: its internship interest form lists FNP and nursing students, which few Southern California health centers say publicly. An interest form opens a conversation rather than a placement, and APU still clears the organization before any time there counts. Our Southern California preceptor guide has approach tips for clinics like these.

Shortages from Hemet to Corona

Primary care designations center on the San Jacinto Valley and Perris. The low-income Hemet/San Jacinto area is designated with a score of 15, updated August 25, 2026, and Perris holds a Medicaid-eligible designation scored 9. Tribal clinics carry several facility designations: Pechanga in Temecula, Soboba in San Jacinto, Morongo in Banning and Cahuilla in Anza.

Mental health gaps reach the largest cities. Riverside/Riverside Central and Corona East are designated low-income mental health shortage areas, each scored 16 and updated in September 2026. Hemet (18), Beaumont (17), San Jacinto (14) and Temecula North (11) are on HRSA's proposed-withdrawal list, though each keeps its standing until HRSA rules, a step due by July 1, 2027. With RUHS's psychiatry limit, PMHNP students here should start early.

Running APU's process from Corona to Temecula

The Graduate Preceptor Request form works here as anywhere: one form per preceptor, asking where you live, the preceptor's credential and email, and the clinic's registered legal name, its authorized signatory and the office manager.

APU's recent guidelines rank a good fit above a short drive and treat a long trip, up to two hours each way, as normal. For a Temecula or Menifee student, that can mean a Riverside preceptor or one in north San Diego County. When APU's team offers a placement, you have one week to confirm, and refusing an offer can cost a late-drop fee waiver later.

Why Riverside County students choose us

Students across western Riverside County choose us because we search the whole map at once: RUHS's published departments, Kaiser, Loma Linda's Murrieta hospital and the health centers from Jurupa Valley to Temecula. We match you with a preceptor who fits your APU course, confirm early whether the organization holds an APU affiliation agreement, and prepare every detail the request form asks for.

When a site runs its own portal, as RUHS does with Clinician Nexus, we time that application with APU's steps so neither waits on the other. If a preceptor steps back mid-term, we are already on the next option. Start with the form below.

Questions APU students ask