HESI DOSAGE CALCULATIONS-LPN TO RN TRANSITION 3 VERSIONS EXAM

X = 42*1/2.2 = 19 kg So the dose is 0.5 mg x 19 kg = 9.5 mg ---------------- that’s the 1st part to get into the final part of the question which is how many ml should be administered? In other words, to get 9.5 mg delivered, how many mL should be given? The key answer is how much solution, ampule, syrup …. you have (in other words, the fixed amount of medicine that would be supplied for you from the pharmacy) So here we have 25 mg / mL in each ampule, and we need to give 9.5 mg, if you arrange it in an equation, it will be: 25 mg ---- 1 mL 9.5 mg ---- x mL (x is always the missing amount that you need to know) X = 9.5 x 1/25 = 0.381 -- round to nearest tenth = 0.4   Question: the healthcare provider prescribes captopril 37.5 mg PO daily. The medication is available in 25 mg tablets. How many tablets should the nurse administer? (Enter numeric only, if rounding is required, round to the nearest tenth). This should be the easiest questions and sometimes you don’t even need to use the calculator, imagine you have a medicine regardless of its name, and it comes in strength of 25 mg, you need to give 37.5 mg, both are same units, so your main concern is how to get 37.5 out of 25? just divide them! And you will get 1.5 tablets! Easy and straight! After you have the answer, just double check yourself, and imagine you have the medicine next to you, and you have 1 tablet of 25 mg and half tablet of 25 mg which is 12.5mg, add them together, 25 + 12.5 = 37.5, which what we need! So your answer is correct! Let’s move to the next question! Question: The PN administers amoxicillin/clavulanate 500 mg PO every 8 hours to a client with a staphylococcus infection. In a 24 hour period. How many mg of amoxicillin/clavulanate should the client receive? (Enter the numerical value only. If rounding is required, round to the whole number.) If you don’t have a good pharmacology/microbiology background, don’t freak out! Just ignore the name of medications/bacteria. 99% they have nothing to do in calculation questions! Just understand the question and you will have the answer by your self! You are talking a medicine with a strength of 500 mg every 8 hours, how many mg you will take in 24 hours? So in other word, how many 8 hours are there in 24 hours? 3! 500 mg x 3 = 1500 mg! Easy! Next… Question: A client is prescribed carbidopa-levodopa 20/200 mg PO BID. The pharmacy delivers carbidopa-levodopa 10/100 mg tablets. The nurse should administer how many tablets at each dose? (Enter the numeric value only. If rounding is required, round to the whole number.) To answer these questions, you should understand the question correctly, make sure you understand the different between how many tablet should be taken at each dose vs how many tablets should be taken per day or every 24 hours. Some questions might trick you with this. So back to our question, you need to give a medicine with a strength of 20/200 but the pharmacy supplied you with a strength of 10/100 of the same medicine, how many tablets you will administer in each dose? The answer is 2 ! and that what the question asked for! Assume the question asks for the 24 dosage? The answer would be 2 tablets BID, which is 4 tablets. Practice make it easy! Let’s move to the next one! Question: The PN/RN plants to administer 1 mg of naloxone IM, the label of the 10 mL vial indicates that the drug concentration is 0.4 mg/ml. How many mL should the PN administer? (Enter numeric value only. If rounding is required, round to the nearest tenth.) Again, to answer such questions, you should understand the question very well! Always find the fixed amount which is the vial/suspension/IV bag/syrup … and compare the required value to it. Here, we have the 10 mL vial with concentration of 0.4 mg/1 mL as the fixed amount, and we need to administer 1 mg out of it, to get 1 mg, let do our equation: 0.4 mg ---- 1 mL 1 mg -------- x mL X = 1 x 1 /0.4 = 2.5 mL So if you take 2.5 mL out of the 10 mL vial, the strength that you will be getting is 1 mg, and that’s the answer.