Mastering Pharmacy Technician Math: A Certification Review

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The review you need to excel on the Pharmacy Technician Certification Board Examination!

Mastering Pharmacy Technician Math: A Certification Review is a super-effective way for students preparing for the Pharmacy Technician Certification Board Examination to improve their ability to perform basic math and pharmacy-specific calculations. The book includes powerful learning aids such as practice exercises in each chapter, end-of-chapter Q&A, a 50-question pretest that reviews key concepts, and three 100-question practice tests to prepare you for the board exam. All questions are correlated to the learning outcomes found in the book so you know exactly what to review should you answer a question incorrectly.

Mastering Pharmacy Technician Math: A Certification Review is logically divided into ten chapters:

Chapter 1: Mathematical Concepts -- reviews the basic mathematical building blocks needed to master advanced pharmacy calculations, including fractions, decimals, percents, ratios, proportions, conversions, and cross-multiplication.

Chapter 2: Numbering Systems -- reviews the different systems of measurement and how to convert within and between them, including working with temperatures and time.

Chapter 3: Understanding Drugs and Drug Orders -- identifies drug strengths, doses, drug forms, and routes of administration and explains how to identify and interpret information on drug labels, package inserts, prescriptions, and medication orders.

Chapter 4: Methods of Dosage Calculations -- presents methods to perform dosage calculations correctly, including fraction proportion, ratio proportion, dimensional analysis, and formulas.

Chapter 5: Oral Dosages -- describes the processes for calculating dosages, amount to dispense, and estimated days' supply for oral medications.

Chapter 6: Parenteral Dosages (Excluding Intravenous) -- describes parenteral medications, including those given by injection; inhalants; transdermal, ophthalmic, and otic drugs; and drugs placed in the rectum or vagina.

Chapter 7: Intravenous Calculations -- describes how to calculate IV concentrations and how to prepare medications for continuous and intermittent IV infusion.

Chapter 8: Special Preparations Calculations -- describes the processes to calculate concentrations, ratio strengths, final volume/final strength, and dilutions, as well as how to write recipes to prepare compound drug orders and perform alligation calculations.

Chapter 9: Medication Safety and Calculations -- discusses pharmacokinetics, high-alert medications, look-alike/sound-alike medications, how to calculate drug half-life values, pediatric and geriatric calculations, DEA controlled substance requirements related to prescriber DEA numbers, and how to perform the calculation needed to verify DEA number validity.

Chapter 10: Business, Inventory, and Reimbursement Calculations -- discusses reimbursements and patient payments, and describes how to calculate overhead costs, profits and losses, markups, turnover rates, and correct costs and change.

Kathryn A. Booth, RN-BSN, RMA (AMT), RPT, CPhT, MS is a registered nurse (RN) with a master’s degree in education as well as certifications in phlebotomy, pharmacy tech, and medical assisting. She is an author, an educator, and a consultant for Total Care Programming, Inc. She has over 30 years of teaching, nursing, and healthcare experience that spans five states. As an educator, Kathy has been awarded the teacher of the year in three states where she taught various health sciences, including medical assisting in both a classroom and an online capacity. Kathy serves on the AMT Examinations, Qualifications, and Standards committee, as well as the advisory board for two educational institutions. She stays current through working at various practice settings as well as obtaining and maintaining certifications. Her larger goal is to develop up-to-date, dynamic healthcare educational materials to assist her and other educators and to promote healthcare professions. In addition, Kathy enjoys presenting innovative new learning solutions for the changing healthcare and educational landscape to her fellow professionals nationwide.

Lynn M. Egler, RMA, AHI, CPhT (Madison Heights, MI) served in the United States Navy as a hospital corpsman and emergency medical technician during Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm. Mrs. Egler is currently affiliated with Dorsey Schools in Madison Heights, Michigan, as an Allied Health instructor.

Kathryn A. Booth, RN, BSN, MS, RMA, RPT is an author, consultant, vice president, and owner of Total Care Programming, a multimedia software development company. care materials that will assist health care educators and promote the health care profession.