Under standing orders for analgesia, the increments are:

• A. Morphine 10 mg; Fentanyl 100 mcg
• B. Morphine 5 mg; Fentanyl 50 mcg
• C. Morphine 15 mg; Fentanyl 75 mcg
• D. Morphine 20 mg; Fentanyl 200 mcg

Answer: (A)

In standing orders for analgesia, doses are given in fixed, equianalgesic increments to titrate pain effectively while staying safe. For morphine and fentanyl, an approximate equianalgesic relationship is 1 mg morphine ≈ 10 mcg fentanyl, so one standard dose increment is about 10 mg morphine or 100 mcg fentanyl.

The best choice uses that standard increment: morphine 10 mg with fentanyl 100 mcg. This pairing reflects the defined dose step you’d give per administration to achieve a consistent, predictable effect.

The other options either use nonstandard increments (for example, a 15 mg/75 mcg pairing isn’t an equivalent increment) or a smaller increment (5 mg/50 mcg) that isn’t the defined step, or a larger amount that effectively doubles the standard increment (20 mg/200 mcg would be two increments at once).