Published: Sunday, December 21, 2014 at 11:20 p.m. Last Modified: Sunday, December 21, 2014 at 11:20 p.m.

Angela Parker wanted to take her children to their pediatrician's office when they got sick, but she couldn't miss too much time from work.

Adding advanced registered nurse practitioners to the mix of patient care resolved both their problems.

Nguyen, a pediatrician at Bond Clinic, works with two nurse practitioners.

That allowed the clinic to start evening pediatric hours during the past year, which let Parker bring her children there after work Tuesday when they had bad sore throats.

That's one of many examples of how nurse practitioners registered nurses with master's or doctoral degrees and specific additional clinical training are becoming a more noticeable part of Polk County's health care.

Their increasing presence often is overlooked amid annual legislative battles on expanding nurse practitioners' autonomy in Florida.

Advanced nurse practitioners straddle the nursing and physician approach to care, adding another skilled professional who can assess, diagnose and treat a growing patient load.

"As we have expanded the patient population, I alone cannot have enough time to take care of all the patients we have," said Nguyen, pronounced "win," who also provides a clinical training site for student nurse practitioners. Bond Clinic has 17 nurse practitioners now, making up more than one-fourth of its health care providers. When Nguyen arrived seven years ago, the clinic had three, he said.

A similar transformation took place at Central Florida Health Care, the nonprofit community health center with clinics throughout Polk. It had two when Dr. Heather Lutz, its chief clinical officer, came three years ago.

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Nurse Practitioners Help Ease the Strain In Health Care Systems