Tablet and Capsule Dosage Questions for the NMC CBT

Tablet questions are the easiest marks in Part A, which is exactly why losing one hurts. The formula is one line and the exam knows you know it. So the questions are built to catch something else: a unit mismatch, an unsafe split, or a strength misread under time pressure.

The formula: number of tablets = dose prescribed ÷ strength of one tablet.

Nurses usually say it as “what you want over what you’ve got”. Prescribed 1 g, stock 500 mg tablets:

• Convert: 1 g = 1,000 mg.
• Divide: 1,000 ÷ 500 = 2 tablets.

That’s the whole method. Now the parts the exam actually tests.

The half-tablet rule

A tablet can only be split when it’s scored and the formulation allows it. Modified-release (MR, SR, XL), enteric-coated (EC) and film-coated formulations designed for delayed release must stay whole; splitting them dumps the full dose at once. Capsules can’t be split at all.

The CBT uses this two ways. Sometimes a question tells you the tablet is scored and expects 1.5 as the answer. Sometimes it gives you numbers that produce a half from an MR tablet, and the correct response is to query the prescription. Read the formulation words in the question stem. They’re never decoration.

The awkward-fraction warning

Real-world tablet answers are whole numbers or clean halves. When your division produces 3.7 or 0.4, don’t round it. Something upstream is wrong: usually a missed conversion (dividing grams by milligrams) or a misread strength. In the exam this instinct saves you, because the wrong options are built from exactly those upstream errors.

The general sanity range is half a tablet to four tablets. There are honest exceptions, and the exam knows them too: prednisolone at 30 mg from 5 mg tablets means six tablets, and that’s a normal steroid dose. So the range is a prompt to look twice, not an absolute rule.

Worked example under exam conditions

Prescription: digoxin 0.125 mg. Stock: 62.5 mcg tablets.

• Units differ, so convert: 0.125 mg = 125 mcg.
• Divide: 125 ÷ 62.5 = 2 tablets.

Notice the exam’s favourite move: the conversion and the division use the same digits (125, 62.5), so a candidate who skips the conversion still gets an answer that feels plausible. The protection is mechanical, not clever. Same units first, every time.

If you haven’t seen the full set of Part A methods laid out, the numeracy methods chapter in the main guide covers all eight. The five questions below are in exam format; do them before moving on to oral liquids, where the same formula grows a third term.