(a) An applicant who is licensed in California as a vocational nurse is eligible to apply for licensure as a registered nurse if such applicant has successfully completed the courses prescribed below and meets all the other requirements set forth in section 2736 of the code. Such applicant shall submit evidence to the board, including a transcript, of successful completion of the requirements set forth in subsection (c) and of successful completion or challenge of courses in physiology and microbiology comparable to such courses required for licensure as a registered nurse.

(b) The school shall offer objective counseling of this option and evaluate each licensed vocational nurse applicant for admission to its registered nursing program on an individual basis. A school's determination of the prerequisite courses required of a licensed vocational nurse applicant shall be based on an analysis of each applicant's academic deficiencies, irrespective of the time such courses were taken.

(c) The additional education required of licensed vocational nurse applicants shall not exceed a maximum of thirty (30) semester or forty-five (45) quarter units. Courses required for vocational nurse licensure do not fulfill the additional education requirement. However, other courses comparable to those required for licensure as a registered nurse, as specified in section 1426, may fulfill the additional education requirement.

Nursing courses shall be taken in an approved nursing program and shall be beyond courses equivalent to the first year of professional nursing courses. The nursing content shall include nursing intervention in acute, preventive, remedial, supportive, rehabilitative and teaching aspects of nursing. Theory and courses with concurrent clinical practice shall include advanced medical-surgical, mental health, psychiatric nursing and geriatric nursing. The nursing content shall include the basic standards for competent performance prescribed in section 1443.5 of these regulations.