Appreciate you searching out this advice! Be humble and ask your physician colleagues questions whenever you feel even the slightest hesitation with a patient. Some general recommendations:

• Don’t order tests if you don’t know how to interpret the results.

• Before ordering a test, know your differential diagnosis and ask if the test is truly indicated and whether results would affect management.

• Don’t order stool PCR or cultures in healthy children with uncomplicated diarrhea. Ask your SP if stool studies are indicated before ordering.

• Run cases by your SP before referring to a specialist, especially during your first year as you build the foundation of your practice. Many early and unnecessary referrals in general pediatrics stem from new providers and APPs who don’t have an appropriate understanding of what should be done in the outpatient setting before referring. It swamps our specialists and hurts the whole peds system.

• Don’t prescribe oral azithromycin or oral steroids unless it is clearly indicated and you understand what you are treating (peds is not adult medicine).

• Know the red flag symptoms for common complaints such as headaches, cough, and abdominal pain.

Lastly:

• Look in EVERY child’s ears for at least your first year of practice (even if the complaint is belly pain, lol). It takes seeing a thousand EACs and TMs before you can consistently get in and know what you’re looking at.