Misguided midlevel malice: genius CNM diagnoses diverticulitis on CT

Sometimes, it seems like the only thing that nurse midlevels are certified in is idiocy, as demonstrated by this hilarious tale of one midlevel (a "certified" nurse midwife) trying to one-up another midlevel (a physician assistant). It's plainly apparent from this story that the CNM couldn't tell the difference between diverticulosis and diverticulitis from their own chocolate starfish. Meanwhile, a second-year medical student would be slapped silly on the USMLE/COMLEX board exams for failing to understand the difference between the two. This smooth-brained CNM must feel like such a genius for reading between the lines of the impression of this CT scan and making the logical jump from "a few diverticula" to acute diverticulitis! I bet she (he?) feels like a rockstar for starting the patient on Flagyl, too! Does this intellectually gifted CNM realize that Flagyl alone is an insufficient treatment for diverticulitis? Surely they must have learned all about the intricacies of gastrointestinal pathology in their 700 clinical hours of nurse midwifery school!

It's mind-boggling, and quite frankly frightening, that a nurse midwife can act as a primary care provider in many localities. It's self-evident from the above program of study that their didactic and clinical training doesn't even begin to hold a handle to that of a primary care physician's medical school education and residency training in internal medicine, family medicine, pediatrics, etc. Midwifery school must be really time-efficient if they can pack all of a three-year medical residency into a two-credit course called "Primary Care of Women"!