Medication doses

psu_213, BSN, RN · Apr 23, 2018

Kanamycin 700mg IM. The Kanamycin label states,add 5ml sterile H2O to 1 g kanamycin;0.5g=2ml
how many milliliters should be given

It really is not going to do you much good if we just hand you correct number, so think it out.

After you reconstitute the 1 g of drug with the 5 mL, how many mg of drug are in each mL. So then how many mL are needed to give you your 700 mg? Also, where did you get 0.5g = 2mL? You might want to recheck that.

meanmaryjean, DNP, RN · Apr 23, 2018

Does your instructor know you are posting your homework online asking others to give you the answers?

bjwojcik · Apr 23, 2018

I think it is fine to help her understand the process, just as long as we don't do her homework without her learning anything. The way I like to explain it is that there are three parts to these problems: a given (in this case 700 mg), the units of the answer (mL), and one or more ratios which you will use to change the units of the given into the units of the answer.

And yes, there is an error in the question unless the water somehow contracted during the reconstruction. Ha.

chare · Apr 23, 2018

[...]
And yes, there is an error in the question unless the water somehow contracted during the reconstruction. Ha.

Unfortunately, I don't think it's an error. If the OP posted the problem as it was presented, I think it's another example of an instructor too lazy to research the medication and use real-world data.

bjwojcik · Apr 23, 2018

Jean, since it says that 0.5 g = 2 mL, you can make a ratio out of that. 0.5 g/2 mL which can be flipped upside down giving you 2 mL/5 g. Since 0.5 g = 2 mL, both of those ratios equal 1. Since you can see that the given is in mg, it is easiest to just change the 0.5 g to 500 mg, if you understand that. Start the problem off by writing down the given and the units of the answer with some space after the given to put in the rstio(s).

700 mg = mL. Now pick out the ratio that will have mg on the bottom and mL on top. The mg will cancel out leaving mL in the answer.