In Mental Health... And going mental over these drugs!

Nursing Students LPN/LVN Students

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As I'm sure many before me have said or thought, 'I should have tried harder in pharmacology.' Now I'm half way through the entire LPN program, and finally met my match. A class that has me on the fence all because of one little thing - drugs.

In mental health in general - the disorders, therapeutic talking, etc, I excel. But, what is bringing me down is that no matter how many times I read - and reread, I can't remember the antipsychotics, antidepressants, etc for the life of me.

What are some study tips I can utilize? I am in an excelerated program and only have 5 weeks to learn the class. It's been 2.5 weeks so far and I recognize that after 2 tests that I need to change what I'm doing - and fast.

Specializes in Critical Care, Med-Surg, Psych, Geri, LTC, Tele,.

Learn 1 drug per category or classification really well. Try to learn the one medication that seems to be commonly used in real life a lot or that your teacher keeps mentioning.

For us, that would be:

1 upper (an amphetamine)

1 downer (a sedative/hypnotic/or barb)

1 barbituate

1 anti seizure

1 ssri

1 maoi

For me, it turned out I did know a little about meds when I thought of it this way. Learn how each category works.

I didn't stress myself trying to learn every single medicine. I did cram names of meds into my short term memory right before tests as best I could.

I recommend focusing on categories and 1 representative per category really well.

google /Illustrated-Pharmacology-Memory-Cards-PharMnemonics they are awesome!

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