How Safemedicate Can Assist Learners’ Efforts To Perform Optimal Bodyweight Dosage Calculations

Posted by Liz Seyi on July 30th, 2022

There may be a need for medications, especially those for children, to be prescribed in accordance with the bodyweight of the patient, or even their body surface area (BSA). Medication dosage calculations that account for a person’s weight are particularly common on paediatric wards. 

The bodyweight of an adolescent for example will be significantly more than that of a newborn baby. As such, it is easy to understand the importance of accurately prescribing the correct dose to be administered.

safeMedicate will teach you the importance of factoring in the patients bodyweight or BSA when calculating and administering certain drugs, for example, antibiotics, drugs used to treat epilepsy or drugs administered during or following surgical procedures. 

The role of our own learning environments in ensuring accurate dosage

The safeMedicate suite of programs – offered by the market-leading company Authentic World Ltd – encompasses a range of learning and assessment modules to ensure healthcare professionals are better placed to perform safe and accurate bodyweight dosage calculations.

Specifically, the Bodyweight Based & Body Surface Calculations module provides a highly visual and interactive learning environment, designed by experienced nurse educators and clinical pharmacists.

This Advanced Skills module builds naturally on what is included in the Essential Skills module, and enables healthcare students or practitioners to progress to developing the competencies needed for this more complex area of medication practice.

What will you be trained in when you take on this module?

If you are a student or a healthcare professional who needs to develop a conceptual understanding of Bodyweight & BSA drug dosage calculations, this safeMedicate module will provide you with a complete learning and assessment environment to do so. 

You will learn about the interpretation of medication orders, medication product labels, drug monographs, and other essential information to accurately calculate prescribed drug dosages and total and divided 24-hour maintenance fluid requirements, on the basis of the patient’s kilogram bodyweight or BSA.

Furthermore, this Advanced Skills module will enable you to demonstrate skills in medication measurement by selecting the most appropriate syringe for the drug and dose to be given and accurately measuring the correct volume of prescribed medication.

With regard to children and neonates, you will also learn how to measure total and divided 24-hour maintenance fluid volumes, and setting millilitre per hour intravenous infusion pump rates.

Enquire today to the safeMedicate team

For more details about this Bodyweight and BSA drug dosage calculations module or about any other aspect of learning and assessment with Safemedicate, please do not hesitate to reach out to us.

We are committed to helping ensure students and healthcare professionals benefit from the optimal solutions for developing competence in safe medication practice.  

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Liz Seyi

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Liz Seyi
Joined: August 13th, 2019
Articles Posted: 1,554

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