from Cornell University
Stop spooning! It’s probably not what
you think. Cornell University Food and
Brand Lab researchers found use of
teaspoons or tablespoons to dispense
medicine results in under or over dosing.
They found people using teaspoons to
measure medicine under-dosed by eight
point four percent on average and
people using tablespoons over-dosed by
nearly twelve percent. The study of
young adults found more than one-third
used kitchen spoons most frequently to
measure medicine. However, when
directions for dispensing medicine were
given in milliliters instead of teaspoons,
the risk of dosage error decreased by
about fifty percent. This is especially
critical when giving liquid medicines to
children—too little may be ineffective,
too much could be worse.