was i truely wrong

Compassion_x · Jan 19, 2013

Speaking strictly on the rounding - my guess is that it wouldn't be a med error since .66 and .666 and .67 are all so close. But mathematically you should ALWAYS round up if you're going to put your answer in the thousandths place.

rvd4now · Jan 19, 2013

Speaking strictly on the rounding - my guess is that it wouldn't be a med error since .66 and .666 and .67 are all so close. But mathematically you should ALWAYS round up if you're going to put your answer in the thousandths place.

i truely know i should of rounded, I did ask her doing the test if she wanted me to round...

Iâ™¥Scrubs, LPN · Jan 19, 2013

That's a good question. But yes, less then 1ml is a TB syringe so round to the 100th, greater than 1ml, round to the tenth. Maybe it isn't a med error because it wasn't in real life, it was just in practice?

And on a side note, our teachers will not tell us where to round to anymore. We have to know it. If it doesn't tell us where to round and we ask they tell us we should know where to round and walk away. We had to take a "gotta get a 100 math test" and even if you did all the math right but rounded wrong or put the wrong label you had to do it all over again.

rvd4now · Jan 19, 2013

That's a good question. But yes less then 1ml is a TB syringe so round to the 100th, greater than 1ml, round to the tenth. Maybe it isn't a med error because it wasn't in real life, it was just in practice?[/quote']
even in real life i dont think it would of been a med error. because i can truly draw up .66ml

Iâ™¥Scrubs, LPN · Jan 19, 2013

even in real life i dont think it would of been a med error. because i can truly draw up .66ml

I really don't know, other than if it's less than 1 mL you need to round to the 100ths place, it's just how it is. Let us know the reasoning they give you!

NICUmiiki, DNP, NP · Jan 19, 2013

Even though you can draw up .66, .67 is closer to .666

The rounded (.67) error would be .003

The non-rounded (.66) error would be .006

I would think that you should reduce the error as much as possible even in small quantities, which is why you would round up.

Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN · Jan 19, 2013

Real life you are right you would give the .66 but real life is not school....so the answer is .67. follow your schools rules for rounding:)

KelRN215, BSN, RN · Jan 19, 2013

today i had a simple test question in pham,
my order was for 5500u of heparin i had on hand 75000u. my number came out to .666
Before i turned in my paper i asked my teacher if she wanted me to round to .67. She replied with "just answer the question", so i left .66ml on the paper. my rational was that with a tb syringe i can give .66 & i was not asked to round.
My teacher stated i was wrong for not rounding. I then asked if it would be a mad error wait for it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! wait for it!!!!!!!!!!!! nope it would not be a med error if i gave .66..
so now im confused how would it not be a med error, but its a math error.

Well, your math is wrong based on the numbers you provided here so the rounding part doesn't really matter.

The way you have it written, you had an order for 5500 units and had 75,000 on hand. 5500 units/75,000 is 0.073 mL.

Your answer would be 0.67 if your order was for 5000 units (not 5500) and your concentration was 7500 (not 75 thousand) u/mL. Was that what you had and you mistyped it here?

With a TB syringe or other 1 mL syringes, you can measure to 0.01 cc. Regardless of if your teacher told you to round or not, you round up for numbers > or = to 5 and down for numbers

rvd4now · Jan 20, 2013

Well, your math is wrong based on the numbers you provided here so the rounding part doesn't really matter.
The way you have it written, you had an order for 5500 units and had 75,000 on hand. 5500 units/75,000 is 0.073 mL.
Your answer would be 0.67 if your order was for 5000 units (not 5500) and your concentration was 7500 (not 75 thousand) u/mL. Was that what you had and you mistyped it here?
With a TB syringe or other 1 mL syringes, you can measure to 0.01 cc. Regardless of if your teacher told you to round or not, you round up for numbers > or = to 5 and down for numbers
yes, I did miss type. I know i should of rounded, I guess I will have to take the 98 %. I was really shooting for the 100% lol