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Drug Calculator
Written by Administrator   
Thursday, 10 December 2009
Drug Infusions
The issue of the formulation of drug infusions in paediatrics is unresolved. Children’s services have traditionally used a variable concentration system (i.e. put x mg of drug per kg into 50ml). The Department of Health has mandated fixed concentrations for most clinical areas including neonatology. Paediatrics has an exemption at present because a number of fixed concentrations would be required to meet the needs of the paediatric population. The drug calculators for PICU reflect this equivocal position at present.

Sheffield Children’s Hospital uses variable concentrations up to 50kg, whereas Leeds PICU uses variable concentrations up to 16kg and fixed thereafter. The respective drug calculators reflect these differences. Embrace will follow the Sheffield formulary by default. However if a child is coming to Leeds and the infusions have been made up, prescribed and labelled appropriately, Embrace staff will continue an infusion that has been set up according to “the Leeds recipe”.

An adequate prescription and syringe label must include:
  • The patients name, the weight on which calculations are based and one other identifier (DoB or Unit no. or NHS no.)
  • The mass (and batch number) of the drug to be administered e.g. 15mg dopamine.
  • The total volume of the syringe, (batch number) and nature of the diluent e.g. made up to 50ml in 0.9% saline.
  • The rate (or range of rates) of administration e.g. 5 to 10microgram/kg/min.
  • Signature, date and time.

  
Syringes that are not prescribed and labelled to this standard will be changed. 
Last Updated ( Thursday, 10 December 2009 )
 
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