School refuses to medication math to students

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Attatched to our capstone class is a medication math exam that must be passed with a 90% minimum. We are all aware of how imprortant it is to reduces med errors with good math skills. The problem is that at Ivy Tech in Gary IN, we have been told that it is against school policy to teach the students this type of math. This seems contridictory to me. We were told to buy a book and learn it on our own. Isn't this why we pay tuition?

I could really use some advice.

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I think it's pretty common. We had the exam in the first week of the first semester of school - 90% requirement. In the following semesters, we had the med math exam the first or second day and less than 100% was failure.

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Specializes in med/surg, telemetry, IV therapy, mgmt.

there are tutorials on how to do medical calculations on post #2 of this sticky thread: https://allnurses.com/general-nursing-student/nursing-math-thread-264395.html - the nursing math thread.

you can also see examples of problems that have been worked out on this older thread: https://allnurses.com/nursing-student-assistance/dosage-calculations-88867.html - dosage calculations

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Specializes in Telemetry & Obs.

Welcome to nursing school.

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Specializes in Cardiac.

Yes, welcome to nursing school indeed.

I had to learn it on my own too. It's easy to do and no reason why you can't do it.

Get used to it. As a nurse, 100% of my learning done now is on my own.

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Specializes in ICU, Heart/Lung transplant.

Dito, welcome to nursing school.

I'm in Jacksonville FL. in a BSN program & they give us a book with a bunch of math questions & we have a math test at the beginning of every semester.We have to get a 95% or withdraw from the program. We even had some Pitocin calculation problems on one of our OB tesets.

Just keep doing the math every month or so to keep it in your head. So when test time comes around you won't be so stressed.

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Ivy tech Valpo has a book/dvd called Calculating drug Dosages, which was a required text that we bought from the book store. In fundamentals, we were told to study certain modules and we had five or six tests to take, print, and turn in. Our first math competency test was Monday. There were three study sessions held beforehand, and teachers went over the math if you needed extra help. I did not hear that they could or would not teach the math, and it is all math covered in math 93 and 111.

good luck!

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we have to pass a med math exam each semester with a 100%. We use the Henke's Med-math book... I bought mine used. good luck

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I was told that all Ivy Tech NRSG programs had to be consistent. While I am glad that you are getting the education you deserve, it is clearly not the same case over here. We were told by our instructor as well as the program chair that it is against school policy to instruct us on this math. We had no study sessions and remediation consisted of take home packets that were not reviewed prior to the exam. May I ask who you instructor was?

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Specializes in Maternal - Child Health.

If this is part of your capstone class, does that mean that it is your final class prior to graduation? If so, perhaps the faculty believes that you need to be proficient on your own at this late point in your nursing education.

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I understand the need to be proficient. Medication errors can be life threatening. All the more reason to have at least a little instruction on the subject. Don't you agree?

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We needed a 100% each semester. Alot of them are basic algebra type questions, which you should have done in pre-reqs. By a good math calculation book for nurses to study with.

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