CDC exam — is the insurance coding section really as hard as people say?

I'm scheduled for the Certified Dental Consultant exam in about six weeks and I've been seeing a lot of warnings about the insurance and billing domain being the hardest section. I've got about 15 years of dental office management experience so I figured I'd be okay, but I'm starting to wonder if I'm underestimating it.

My practice test scores in the dental procedure and clinical terminology domains are solid — I'm averaging around 85-88% there. But when I get into the insurance coding questions, specifically anything involving ADA CDT codes, claim adjudication principles, and coordination of benefits scenarios, I drop to somewhere around 68-70%. That's well below the passing threshold and I've got six weeks to close the gap.

Part of the problem is that my day-to-day experience is with a specific set of common procedures and their billing. The exam seems to test edge cases — like the specific criteria for downcoding, upgrade scenarios, and documentation requirements when there's a discrepancy between submitted and paid procedures. Those scenarios don't come up in my normal workflow so they feel unfamiliar even though I theoretically know the rules.

I've ordered the NADP study guide and I'm planning to spend the next three weeks almost exclusively on insurance content before switching to full practice exams in the final stretch. If anyone's taken this recently and has a sense of whether the insurance questions are more conceptual or application-based, I'd really appreciate knowing what to expect.