Consult with or refer patients to appropriate specialists when conditions exceed the scope of practice or expertise.

“Consult with or refer patients to appropriate specialists when conditions exceed the scope of practice or expertise.” is a core task performed by Nurse Midwives. Among the occupation's 21 rated tasks, workers place it 7th by importance (#15 most important). About 100% of workers say it is relevant to their job.

This is a single occupation-specific task statement from O*NET. The figures below describe how central the task is to the job and what independent studies measure about AI and this kind of work — not a prediction that the task will be automated.

Work activities this task rolls up to

O*NET groups concrete tasks into broader work activities shared across many occupations.

• Confer with healthcare or other professionals about patient care. in Communicating with Supervisors, Peers, or Subordinates
• Assist others to access additional services or resources. in Assisting and Caring for Others

AI exposure

The OpenAI / Eloundou “GPTs are GPTs” study rates this task E2. Exposure with tools — software built on top of a language model (not the model alone) could cut the time by at least half.

Exposure measures whether a model could meaningfully speed the task up — it is an estimate of overlap with model capabilities, not a measure of whether the work will be done by software. The study's intermediate score (β) for this task is 0.50. Automation potential label: T2.

Other tasks in this occupation

• Provide prenatal, intrapartum, postpartum, or newborn care to patients. · importance 5.0
• Monitor fetal development by listening to fetal heartbeat, taking external uterine measurements, identifying fetal position, or estimating fetal size and weight. · importance 5.0
• Document patients' health histories, symptoms, physical conditions, or other diagnostic information. · importance 5.0
• Provide patients with direct family planning services, such as inserting intrauterine devices, dispensing oral contraceptives, and fitting cervical barriers, including cervical caps or diaphragms. · importance 4.9
• Develop and implement individualized plans for health care management. · importance 4.9
• Prescribe medications as permitted by state regulations. · importance 4.9
• Explain procedures to patients, family members, staff members or others. · importance 4.9
• Order and interpret diagnostic or laboratory tests. · importance 4.8
• Initiate emergency interventions to stabilize patients. · importance 4.8
• Educate patients and family members regarding prenatal, intrapartum, postpartum, newborn, or interconception care. · importance 4.8
• Document findings of physical examinations. · importance 4.8
• Perform physical examinations by taking vital signs, checking neurological reflexes, examining breasts, or performing pelvic examinations. · importance 4.8
• Write information in medical records or provide narrative summaries to communicate patient information to other health care providers. · importance 4.7
• Provide primary health care, including pregnancy and childbirth, to women. · importance 4.7

See all tasks on the Nurse Midwives page.

Sources for this page

Every figure above traces to a named public dataset and the exact release below — not hand-written opinion. See the full methodology for what each measure does and does not mean.

• O*NET 30.3 U.S. Department of Labor / National Center for O*NET Development
• “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130 OpenAI / academic

Data compiled June 2, 2026. Figures are estimates, not advice.

@misc{singulariki-task-18446,
  title  = {Consult with or refer patients to appropriate specialists when conditions exceed the scope of practice or expertise.},
  author = {{Singulariki}},
  year   = {2026},
  note   = {O*NET 30.3; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130. Accessed June 7, 2026},
  url    = {https://singulariki.com/tasks/task-18446}
}