JPINFV
Gadfly
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A fully licensed physician (MD or DO) is not comparable to other medical and nursing providers (including NPs, PAs, and CRNAs, however not DPMs, DMDs, ODs, and DPTs who can practice within their specialty). A fully licensed physician is licensed to practice unrestricted medical care. In other words, there is no "scope of practice" for a physician because everything is technically in their scope of practice. Similarly, a physician doesn't lose the legal ability to practice medicine when s/he steps outside of the hospital or office, hence why every EMS system should have a formal procedure for dealing with physicians on scene.
Now licensing for physicians is kinda of weird compared to other health care providers since most states require at least a full year of residency (also called an internship year). So someone who graduates from medical school and never completes residency has earned the postnominals of MD or DO, however they lack a license to practice. In like manner, Step 3 (the last of the 3 physician licensing exams) is taken during the intern year.
So yes, even though she has graduated from medical school, since she hasn't completed step 3 and her intern year (there is no need to complete residency to be a licensed physician), she can not practice as one and is limited to the scope of practice of paramedics. Similarly, there is absolutely nothing limiting physicians from practicing prehospital medicine, including not being affiliated with an EMS service.
