A nurse needs to give 600 mg of a medication. If the available formulation is 150 mg/5 mL, how many mL should be administered?

To determine how many mL should be administered when the nurse needs to give 600 mg of a medication, and the available formulation is 150 mg per 5 mL, you can use a proportion to find the necessary volume.

First, you can set up the calculation based on the concentration provided. The concentration indicates that 150 mg is contained in 5 mL. To find out how many mL corresponds to 600 mg, you can proportionally scale up from the known amount:

1. Calculate how many mg are in 1 mL:

[

\text{Amount in 1 mL} = \frac{150 \text{ mg}}{5 \text{ mL}} = 30 \text{ mg/mL}

]

2. Next, to find out how many mL is needed for 600 mg, you can set up the equation:

[

\text{mL needed} = \frac{600 \text{ mg}}{30 \text{ mg/mL}} = 20 \text{ mL}

]

In this case, the calculation shows that to administer 600 mg, 20 mL of the formulation is needed. The