What Kind of Doctor Am I on the Step 3 CCS Portion of the exam?

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What Kind of Doctor Am I on the Step 3 CCS Portion of the exam?


This is a common source of confusion about the role of the person your are “pretending” to be as the treating physician on the Step 3 portion of the CCS Cases. The answer is that you are a primary care physician “generalist.” You can treat the patient in both the inpatient and outpatient settings. You are responsible for the ordering of tests, imaging studies, diagnostic procedures, changing of clinical locations, monitoring the patient over simulated time, preparatory patient care (i.e. getting IV fluids, blood type and cross, antibiotics prior to surgery), and addressing health maintenance issues.


If you order a procedure that you are not trained for (i.e. brain surgery), the medical staff will either assist you or take primary responsibility for implementing your request. Therefore, you should not be shy about ordering surgical procedures or specialized interventions that a normal primary care provider would never do as long as it is indicated for the case.


If you’d like to try out our program, you can download two free cases here.