How to Master Nursing Calculations

Improve Your Maths and Make Sense of Drug Dosage Charts

Chris John Tyreman

• Publisher: Kogan Page
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9780749467548
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Study Aids
• Subtopic: Study Guides

For the maths-phobic, this 2nd edition of the best-selling How to Master Nursing Calculations, is ideal practice for learning key numeracy skills. The perfect companion for your training and in the first few crucial years of your career, it builds your competency through practice, revision and every day examples. Contents includes a review of the basics, clear illustrations of instrument scales, medical administration records and pharmaceutical labels as well as a detailed guide to reading drug dosage charts.Including a brand new list of important abbreviations and a section on how to make drug calculations without equations - requiring little mathematical knowledge - How to Master Nursing Calculations, 2nd edition, will help you master complex dosages and turn you into a maths whiz.

CHAPTER 1

Basic arithmetic skills

How to add, subtract, multiply and divide whole numbers

This first chapter is a refresher course in the basic arithmetic skills required for any mathematics test. If you find it too easy you can skip directly to the end-of-chapter questions. However, if you get any of the answers wrong you may have a numeracy problem that requires remedial help.

Numbers and place value

Starting at the simplest level, our number system is easily understood if you consider ‘place value’ where each number from 0 to 9 is written in a column – units, tens, hundreds and so on.

Addition

Numbers to be added must be arranged underneath each other so that the unit columns are in line.

Example: 139 + 226

The first step is to align the numbers in columns.

Then we add the units column (right-hand column) 6 + 9 = 15.

The 5 is placed in the units column and the 10 carried over as one ‘ten’ into the tens column.

Now we add the tens column (middle column) remembering to include the 1 that has been carried:

1 + 2 + 3 = 6 (middle column):

Now we add the hundreds column: 2 + 1 = 3 (left-hand column).

For the addition of three or more numbers, the method is the same.

Example: 200 + 86 + 44 becomes:

Subtraction

Subtraction is concerned with taking things away. Subtraction is the reverse of addition. The most important thing about subtraction is that the larger number is on top (above the smaller), so when subtracting numbers you subtract the smaller number from the bigger number.

As with addition, the numbers must be arranged underneath each other, so that the units columns are in line. After aligning the numbers, we subtract (take away) the columns vertically, starting at the right-hand end (units column).

For example: 374 – 126

The first step is to align the numbers:

The next step is to subtract the units column (the right-hand column): but 4 – 6 we cannot do since 6 is larger than 4. To overcome this problem we borrow 1 from the tens column (this is the same as 10 units) and add it to the 4 in the units column. So our sum now becomes:

14 – 6 (which we can do) = 8

So far we can write:

The next step is to pay back the ‘1’ we have just borrowed from the tens column. There are two methods for doing this and both are now explained.

Met...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Imprint
• Opening
• Contents
• Introduction
• 1 Basic arithmetic skills
• 2 Fractions and decimals
• 3 Measurement
• 4 Drug dosage calculations
• 5 Drug administration
• 6 Mock tests
• Answers to tests
• Appendix 1
• Appendix 2
• Appendix 3
• Full imprint