DISA CastleBranch at NSU: your clinical compliance record
DISA CastleBranch is the compliance portal NSU names for its nursing students. Your immunization and physical exam records go there, and the same company processes your background check. Your program sets the due date, ACON's Office of Student Affairs watches the record, and an item still missing when a clinical site expects you can cost you the placement.
Know your site's list before day one
Tell us your NSU program, your ZIP area and your next clinical term.
What NSU uses DISA CastleBranch for
NSU names one compliance vendor for its nursing students, and it is CastleBranch. ACON's Health and Safety Requirements page explains the choice in a single line: "To handle their Immunization and Physical Examination forms, the programs use CastleBranch, the company responsible for processing background checks." The same page calls the portal DISA CastleBranch, its current name, so expect to see both names in NSU material.
The page applies the requirement to APRN students, Accelerated BSN students and Entry BSN students. For graduate students that takes in the MSN APRN tracks, the postgraduate APRN certificates and the clinical years of the BSN to DNP. The order form for the background check sits on DISA CastleBranch's own website, reached from the ACON page, and the company is also one of the two drug-screening vendors NSU lists.
Think of the account as NSU's copy of your clinical readiness. It is where the college looks to see whether you can be sent to a site, so an item that lives only in your email or your employer's files does not count until it is uploaded and accepted.
What goes into your record
NSU's public description names the items below. The to-do list inside your account shows exactly what your program has assigned to you, with instructions for each item, so treat that list as the working checklist.
- Immunization records: hepatitis B with its titer, the yearly flu shot and TB test, MMR, Tdap and varicella from the health colleges' list, plus anything a clinical site adds. The full list and its yearly items are on our immunizations page.
- Physical examination form: NSU names it beside the immunization records as a DISA CastleBranch upload.
- Background check: CastleBranch processes the level 1 check you authorize at acceptance. A level 2 fingerprint check runs through Florida agencies instead; see NSU background checks.
- Drug screen, when you choose CastleBranch rather than NMS Management Services as the vendor. The policy behind the screen is on drug screening.
Life support cards, your RN license and your insurance card are not part of NSU's public CastleBranch description. Your program or a site may still ask for them, so keep current copies where you can upload them in minutes.
The deadline is set by your program
NSU's wording is exact: "All Immunization and Physical Examination records must be uploaded to the DISA CastleBranch portal by the due date established by your program." There is no single public date for every student. Look for yours in orientation material, your SharkMail inbox and your program's announcements, and ask your program director's office if it is not there.
Reminders arrive on their own. In NSU's words, "DISA CastleBranch will send weekly reminders via email if students are not compliant with any requirement." A reminder means something is missing, rejected or expired. It is not a countdown, and it knows nothing about a clinical site's start date, which can fall earlier than your program's date.
Yearly items restart the cycle. Influenza and TB testing come around every year, so a record that was complete at orientation turns non-compliant later unless you renew on time. Schedule each renewal in the break before a clinical semester rather than in the middle of one.
Who watches the record: ACON Student Affairs
"ACON Student Affairs will monitor DISA CastleBranch," says NSU's page. The office named there is ACON's Office of Student Affairs, which deals with health, drug-screen and background requirements for the college. Its contact details are on the Student Affairs page of the College of Nursing site. Questions about what counts as proof for an item, or why an upload was rejected, belong there.
Student Affairs is a different desk from your clinical coordinator. The coordinator checks the people and the place, judging whether your preceptor is qualified to supervise you under NSU's rules and whether the site gives the experience the course needs; Student Affairs watches your compliance. Both checks must be finished before clinical hours begin, and one does not stand in for the other. The clinical coordinator page covers the approval side.
One record at NSU, more at the site
A complete CastleBranch record satisfies NSU. It may not satisfy the hospital or practice where you train. The handbook's college-level section warns that students "may be required to upload proof of immunizations to multiple online portals to satisfy the requirements of their programs and the training facilities where they are assigned." ACON's own section says students upload documents "to the online portal used by the college" without naming it.
In practice, a large health system can run its own student onboarding, with its own forms, its own screening window and its own orientation modules, on top of NSU's record. A small private practice may ask for little beyond what NSU already holds. Ask each site for its list as soon as the preceptor agrees; our page on clinical site requirements covers what sites commonly ask of NSU students.
One more point: NSU does not publicly name the system APRN students use to log clinical hours. That lives in your course in Canvas and in the graduate clinical guide, not in CastleBranch.
What a missing item does to a placement
The handbook states the rule plainly. When a student has not met every requirement of the affiliated facility by the first scheduled day, the student's placement will be canceled, and a student who has already started "will be asked to leave" (printed page 87). The same page adds that the university is not required to find an alternative site when an immunization is the facility's condition for placement.
The effect reaches beyond one site. NSU expects APRN students to begin clinical hours when didactic coursework begins, to attend weekly and not to compress hours into the start or end of the semester. The placement rule also warns that failing to submit required paperwork before hours start "may jeopardize progression in the course and the A.P.R.N. program." A canceled start leaves little room to recover the hours; the placement fell through page covers the next steps.
A complete CastleBranch record is NSU's check. The site's own list decides whether you start on day one.
Why NSU students plan compliance with us
Our matching starts with the site's onboarding requirements, collected the moment a preceptor says yes and well before you name that preceptor to your clinical coordinator two semesters ahead. You learn early whether the site wants a level 2 fingerprint check, a fresh drug screen, an extra vaccine or a life support card that NSU's record does not hold.
We then set the site's list beside the items in your CastleBranch account and give you a dated plan: what to upload, what to renew before the clinical semester, and what to book now because it takes weeks. Preceptor and site details reach you complete, so what goes to the coordinator fits NSU's rules the first time. If a site changes its rules or a preceptor steps away, your placement advisor finds a replacement. See how it works, or send your program and ZIP area through the form below.
Questions NSU students ask
Is DISA CastleBranch the same company as CastleBranch?
Yes. NSU's Health and Safety Requirements page uses both names for one vendor: it says the programs use CastleBranch for immunization and physical exam forms, then tells students to upload those records to the DISA CastleBranch portal. If an NSU email says CastleBranch and your account says DISA CastleBranch, you are looking at the same record and the same to-do list.
Does CastleBranch approve my preceptor or clinical site?
No. DISA CastleBranch stores and checks your compliance items. Approving the preceptor and the site is your clinical coordinator's job, based on NSU's supervision rules and the course's needs. That approval runs separately, starting with your notice two semesters before the course, and both must be complete before your first clinical hour.
Why do I keep getting CastleBranch emails after uploading everything?
NSU says the weekly reminders go out whenever a student is not compliant with any requirement. Common causes include an upload still under review, a document rejected for a missing detail, or a yearly item such as influenza or TB testing that has reached its renewal date. Open the to-do list in your account to find the flagged item, and ask ACON's Office of Student Affairs if the reason is unclear.
Do I need CastleBranch if I do clinicals where I work?
Yes. The CastleBranch requirement comes from NSU and applies to you as a student wherever you train. Your employer may also run a separate student onboarding for you, because the handbook expects students to satisfy both the program and the training facility. Being an employee does not turn your staff health file into your NSU compliance record.
When is my CastleBranch deadline?
NSU publishes no single date. Records are due "by the due date established by your program," so the date depends on your program and start term. Check orientation material and SharkMail, then confirm with your program director's office. Treat each clinical site's start date as a second deadline, since a facility can expect items earlier than NSU does.
Related pages
Last checked 2026-09-25
We check these pages against NSU's own handbook, catalog and program pages. The graduate clinical guide, your course in Canvas, your clinical coordinator and your program director have the final word.
- NSU College of Nursing: Health and Safety Requirements
- NSU College of Nursing: Office of Student Affairs
- NSU Nursing Student Handbook 2025-2026, printed p. 85 (multiple portals)
- NSU Nursing Student Handbook 2025-2026, printed p. 87 (facility requirements)
- NSU Nursing Student Handbook 2025-2026, printed p. 123 (APRN placement rule)
NSU lets you name your own preceptor. We make sure you have one, close to home and in time.
Tell us your NSU program, your home ZIP area and when your next clinical course starts. We find preceptors who fit the course and have everything ready for your clinical coordinator well before the two-semester notice.
- Preceptors matched to the course: primary care for FNP, acute care for AGACNP, psychiatric care for PMHNP, a practice site for DNP project hours
- Named early enough for NSU's two-semester notice, with license, credentials and site details ready for the coordinator
- Close to your home ZIP code, with clinic days we plan around your work schedule
Start your placement plan
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