Nursing Student and Mental Math

CarolynnLindsey · Mar 15, 2019

My question concerns the use of "mental math" what do you mean? I am a mental health nurs and have been for several years. I assess myself as providing a very high degree of caring and success with my patients whether they are in the home, on the street or in the acute care setting. I have learned and agree that the success hinges on my ability to really listen to what is being said and how that relates to body language and surroundings. I have for myself really taking literally the suggestion to "meet the patient where they are" so that may mean after having a relationship established and the patient is racked with an anxiety situation, using a soft and reassuring tone, encouraging the patient to talk about his/her perception of what is or has happened to bring him/her to the current state and using good communication skills to reframe the perceptions has been helpful. Not all patient who have the mental health diagnosis are violent and truly are not a risk to self or others including the nurse. That requires you to always remain alert, reading body language and the environment while being in charge. I dearly love mental health and seek every opportunity to teach others the positives of speaking into the lives of those with mental illness. I hear nurses say they have difficulty dealing with the mentally ill well the truth is we all have some level of mental illness many may not have a documented diagnosis but we deal with anxiety, depression and symptoms of bipolar disorder. If you use the skills you are acquiring now and trust your self you will do well.

ShadowNurse · Mar 17, 2019

I think the previous poster may have misunderstood your question, and honestly I did too at first (I thought for sure you meant "mental health" as in yours or your patients').

Mental math can be helpful in nursing school, but I don't recommend it when you actually become a nurse. No matter how good you are at math in general, humans make mistakes and our mistakes can be very costly for our patients. Not to mention most of nursing math is elementary algebra, which isn't exactly mental-math friendly. So get comfortable with a simple calculator instead and practice your formulas, such as Volume/Time for IV flow rates or Want/Have for solid medication administration. Being able to instantly recall which formula you need for which problem (and how to correctly fill in the information you need) will be much more useful.

smuin538, ADN, RN · Mar 21, 2019

I am about to graduate from my nursing program, and my suggestion is to go buy a $1 simple calculator from Walmart and keep it in one of your pockets. Some med math can involve multiple steps and trying to calculate everything in your head just seems unwise, unrealistic, and frankly, unsafe.

Jory, MSN, APRN, CNM · Mar 25, 2019

Unless it is simple math, I mean SIMPLE, I always used a calculator.

Do every calculation twice.