They spoiled me and now I'm freaking out !

[NurseLoveJoy88]

So now I'm in my last nursing course and ofcourse at the beggining of each course we have a drug calc exam. So no biggie right ? You study you pass. So I studied and then I get to the exam and to my surprise it was not multiple choice like the rest of the drug calc exams. I was petrified ! Not only was there no answers starring me in the face we had to also get an 85 instead of an 80 to pass. To top everything off instead of finding out that night whether we pass or fail we won't find out until Monday and we tested on Thur. This was a double whammy. Well I did my best I just hope and pray I passed. I'm sorry for complaining. I just don't like to be spoiled and then brought back to reality in such a harsh way. I'm used to multiple choice, having to get an 80 or better to pass, and finding out the same night. Don't spoil us and then change the rules on us later. But thats nursing school for ya and to be honest there is no other place I'd rather be. :loveya: Wish me luck guys. I'll find out monday. It still won't keep me from checking grades q 5min though.

[mommy.19, MSN, RN, APRN]

Ours are by hand, on paper, no multiple choice and you have three tries to get a 100% or you're out. It's interesting to see how every program is different, but not so nice to see how they threw you for a loop. They could've at least *said* something to you. Good luck, I'm sure you did great :)

[cursedandblessed]

I notice the guidelines you gave were all for adults. No pediatrics ... not much about how you would actually give the med ... what you would do in a real-life situation if something didn't seem right ... etc. There was a recent thread here on allnurses about a question (asked by a hospital as part of the interview process) that asked the candidate what she would do if she calculated a dose of some drug to be 40 pills. The new grad was not she answered the question correctly. It was funny to read the comments in that thread. Many of the students made it all very complicated and twisted the question into many different shapes as they struggled to answer it. The experienced nurses all thought the question was easy -- they would do their calculations over again to double-check their work because they probably had made a mistake in their original calculations!

Hmmmm .... interesting

We're taught anything over 3 pills should be questioned. We're taught meds based on mg per kg, and mcg per kg and asked if the dosage ordered is "safe" for peds. They told us in our classes not to bother with BSA, as the hospitals here don't use it.