In: Nursing
A physician prescribes an intravenous infusion of Drug X for a patient. The drug is to be administered at a rate of 2.5 mg/min for 4 hours. The total volume of the IV solution is 250ml. Calculate the drip rate in drops per minute if the dropper set delivers 20 drops per milliliter.
The rate of the infusion= ______ drops/minute
The rate of the infusion = 20.833 drops/ minute.
=(250/240)*20
=(1.041)*20
=20.833 drops/minute.
To calculate the drops per minute, the drop factor is needed. The formula for calculating the IV flow rate (drip rate) is… total volume (in mL) divided by time (in min), multiplied by the drop factor (in gtts/mL), which equals the IV flow rate in gtts/min.