Calculating Drug Dosages
This resource supports the teaching of specific education and training content that can be implemented by classroom instructors in the context of a particular career cluster.
The three healthcare scenario-based activities in this resource introduce students to mathematical applications in the medical field and include using the metric system, conducting unit conversion with dimensional analysis, and practicing solving algebraic equations. Healthcare professionals use math daily to calculate heights and weight, concentrations, and percentages in order to administer the correct dosages of drugs. Key math skills include converting units between the US Customary System (USCS) and the Metric System (SI), converting from ratios to percentages, and calculating the appropriate dosage for patients. Medicines sometimes require the use of a third system of measure, in addition to the USCS and SI. This resource was developed as part of the Career Math Toolbox — a compendium of math problems created by teams of educators and industry professionals illustrating the use of math in a variety of careers. Each problem includes an introduction for educators that describes the math used and the College Readiness Standards and Grade Level Expectations that are addressed by the problem. Each problem also includes a brief description of the career field exemplified by the math scenario. Additional problems in the Toolbox are available at www.pc3connect.org/projects/tranmath.html
This resource contains academic and technical concepts taught in an integrated fashion. Basic mathematics concepts are taught at the same time as corresponding terminology and applications from the Health Science career clusters.
This resource was reviewed and vetted through the Designing Instruction for Career Pathways initiative of the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Vocational and Adult Education under Contract No. ED-CFO-10-A-0072/0001.
