You are doing surgery alone with a technician assisting you when you start to feel faint. What should you do?

"If I couldn't finish or terminate the surgery with the patient in stable condition, I would instruct the circulator nurse to call an associate surgeon; if the crisis were more time-sensitive than that, I would tell her to call a code. I would also make sure the anesthesiologist had the help needed to keep the patient stable. Also, this is a reportable event, so I would report it according to hospital protocol."

Questions like these are asked to make sure you have common sense, overtly, but covertly are really just trying to see how you think 'on the fly' when asked something unusual. Yes, this type of emergency could happen, but it is extremely rare and the question is just to feel you out. As a training exercise, you should be ready to verbalize conventional wisdom here, i.e., that common sense dictates that coverage for the patient have continuity either by terminating the procedure with stability or, ideally, finishing the procedure with stability.

"If I thought I were compromised to the point where I couldn't continue, I would ask the nurse to call an associate immediately."