Finnish nurses' and nursing students' mathematical skills

The health care environment requires that practitioners have sufficient mathematical skills to perform accurate, safe and effective medication administration. This is a highly responsible and nursing task, which is performed daily. In this study 364 nurses and 282 graduating nursing students in Finland completed the Medication Calculation Skills Test (MCS Test). According to the findings students lacked accurate mathematical skills, while nurses attained higher scores in the test. Nurses with an upper secondary school education managed better with the calculation problems than nurses with a lower basic education. Students who had an excellent mark (9-10) in mathematics, had studied mathematics longer at high school and were more satisfied with the amount of medication calculation instructions and scored higher in the MCS Test than others. The differences between the nurses' and students' mathematical skills were significant. The MCS Test could be used to measure one's own skills and to give information of the mathematical skill level for constructing a nursing curriculum or additional training for clinical practice.