Quicky poll

Daily. New med orders are printed by us on the MARS, so when pharmacy brings up the meds we need to check that we are giving the correct dose. There are also heparin by weight that you have to check, antibiotic bags you mix yourself and the occasional IV fluid such at K+ that you must figure the rate.

Lets all get along it's an argument from a class room not from a hospital. =)

koan,

I will be graduating from nursing school in May. Math is HUGE. You will use it everyday. We received Cefzil suspension and the dose is 125mg/5ml. Well, whoever figured it out and put it on the kardex figured it out as 125mg/ml. The client had received only 4 ml of the med when 500 mg was ordered. He wasn't getting a therapeutic dose. He should have been receiving 20ml. It is a simple math error but one that occurs everyday. You ARE responsible to check your 5 rights EVERY time you pour a med. If I hadn't caught that it was an incorrect dose, I would have been guilty of a med error. And this is an example of an error when the math was "easy"... IV drip rates are a little more complicated. Your mg/kg, mcg/kc, u/kg... etc, require a few more steps. MATH IS HUGE and you will use it for every single med that you pour. And the math has to be bang on. Calculating insulin has to be exact... one decimal place over could have terrible consequences.

Another piece of handy advice. Don't use a calculator right now. Why? Our clinical instructors would ask us to figure out an IV drip rate right then and there at the patient's bedside without a calculator. The same for insulin administration. If you couldn't figure it out in your head, you could use a piece of scratch paper and a pen. Our clinical instructors were big on not relying on anything requiring batteries because batteries fail, there are power outtages, etc. You have to be able to do the calculations yourself and you would surprised at the number of people in my class who had to learn basic math skills like long division and cross multiplication before they could do the formulas.

You use math constantly in nursing... seriously, every time you pour a med you need to be sure that it is the correct dose, and to do that, you have to use math.

I use math daily. I think i use it so much it's second nature. I've seen quite a few med errors that wouldn't have been made if the math had been truly understood.

Now I will tell you I don't memorize formulas. I figure eeverything by ratio's and simple crosmultiplication. It better to understand how to set a problem up then to memorize a formula.

Noney

Thank you peeps I will learn it in my head first then the calc, one thing I would'nt do is argue the point that a calculator will "run out of batterys" (mine is photovoltic) and don't say "well if it's dark your calc won't work, it runs on 1 candle power (yes it really does) so if there isn't enough light to use the calc there isn't enough light to administer anything.

The best argument is. "if you can't do it with paper and pencil then you don't understand it, if you don't understand it you won't know when you make a mistake with calc".

Mistakes are easier to see if you understand the math behind them.

Dear Neuro,

thanks for your reply! and wow, you were a cop too. somehow, I've know a couple of cops who used to be nurses!,and vice versa. wow--take care

Don't use it too much in the OR. A lot of things are drawn up in cc's (lidocaine, marcaine, gentamycin, epinephrine, etc.)

Christine

We use math everyday on our floor ...it is critical to be able to do math in figuring out dosages, IV rates/drips, etc.....sometimes a calculator is not available---so know how to do it on paper too (or be sure to have a good calculator with you at all times---but my pockets are already FULL enough with tourniquet, tape, alcohol./betadine swabs, pens, etc).... Good luck!

Typical nurse bickering!!!!

Originally posted by taztaz

Typical nurse bickering!!!!

Was this really necessary? It was a misunderstanding, and it got strightened out. Leave well enough alone.

~ Jen

Like everyone else I use math every day. I also keep a calculator in my pocket, and when in doubt have a coworker double check for me,

Luanne