Is there any hope for pharmacy students??

I know this thread is a bit old but didn’t the OP say that they actually were enjoying their course? Bet they wished they’d never clicked submit.

Apart from one slightly creepy pharmacist in our hospital who asks for the number of every female member of staff who talks to him, the hospital pharmacists I work with seem to really enjoy their work. I’d say there’s every hope OP.

I know this thread is a bit old but didn’t the OP say that they actually were enjoying their course? Bet they wished they’d never clicked submit.

Apart from one slightly creepy pharmacist in our hospital who asks for the number of every female member of staff who talks to him, the hospital pharmacists I work with seem to really enjoy their work. I’d say there’s every hope OP.

There's nothing wrong with the degree to be honest, it's varied, and interesting, but hard work.
Traditionally hospital pharmacists have always been a happier bunch than community pharmacists for about the last 40 years!

Don’t get me wrong, I know some community pharmacists can find themselves very frustrated because they never get to use half their skills. I just about recall a time when a community pharmacist could put together tinctures and creams from scratch and they were real “chemists” (I really am scraping my childhood memories here) and I think it’s a shame they’re not really able to utilise that skill set more.

But I also know that some community pharmacists love the business side of their role. I was one of the first people in our area to take advantage of a pharmacy who’d started offering chicken pox vaccines and I remember that they were such an innovative group, offering travel vaccine clinics etc. They do a lot of community education around vaccines as well and I believe at one time were even offering catch up MMRs.

I think the job is like any really. As interesting as you can make it.

A VERY unrepresentative and atypical picture is persistently painted by this poster Claremont for some reason. Why?? The typical pharmacist annual salary in the NE for a 40ish hour week doesn’t come anywhere close to those figures boasted about.

To achieve the annual salary boasted by Izzy/Claremont4ever would in practice mean working a 60 plus hour week with extensive travelling on days off from full time position to locum at those particular pharmacies that have to offer a higher rate to attract pharmacist cover because of timing, their location or “hell hole” reputation.

The base of this working week would be regular 16 hour (yes, sixteen) shifts at an extended hour supermarket pharmacy as mentioned in their earlier posts. Time off would be minimal. Undesirable and unsustainable long term lifestyle for almost all and more importantly dangerous to patients. Tired pharmacists are far more likely to make harmful, possibly fatal, dispensing errors.

Don’t be mislead. Do your own individual research. Go into pharmacies and ask the working pharmacists. Oh…and please don’t just focus on salaries. Ask about stress and working conditions. Ask about career structure. Ask about the future. Ask if they regret their career choice. You may have your eyes opened. Reality of community pharmacy today is most likely NOTHING like the picture the Unis are painting.

I’ve picked pharmacy to do as my undergraduates but I’m constantly reading about the negatives regarding pharmacy
I don’t have the grades to do medicine or any of the other stem related courses and I’m not sure as to what to do
I don’t want to enter a career I won’t enjoy but I’d love to work within a science related sector
My results are on the 10th of August
What would you all advice given that you’ve worked in this career industry

I’ve picked pharmacy to do as my undergraduates but I’m constantly reading about the negatives regarding pharmacy
I don’t have the grades to do medicine or any of the other stem related courses and I’m not sure as to what to do
I don’t want to enter a career I won’t enjoy but I’d love to work within a science related sector
My results are on the 10th of August
What would you all advise given that you’ve worked in this career industry

I graduated in 2018. I got my first job as a relief on £42,000, this went up to £55,000 after 3 months when I became a branch manager. An increase in hours led my wages to go up to £65,000 just a year after graduation. My accountant just completed my self-assessment tax return recently which includes pay I get from locumming on the side,the tax return says I made a combined wage of just over £82,000 between April 2020 and April 2021. The current average hourly locum pay in certain areas in the North is £35/hour week day and £40/hour weekends as it's coming up to the busy summer holidays and winter flu period. Pharmacists are in exceptional demand over here.

The stories of low pay in pharmacy is mainly propagated by pharmaciists working in the south who are unwilling to relocate to where there are better wages.

I know this is a week old post but I can agree with this. I work in admin at the head office for the local pharmacies where I live in the North East, and the locums barter for about £40/50 quid an hour. They’ll know they’ll get it because they’re in such high demand too.

Do some work experience in your local chemist.

Pharmacy isn't a bad career per se but it drags down a lot of people who work in it. You can work in hospital, community, GP surgery and industry. Most of the complaints come from community pharmacy because you're essentially a glorified shop keeper. A large portion of patients don't appreciate a pharmacist's role and wages have stagnated for the last 20 years.

The last point is especially important with dissatisfaction. There's one person on here who boasts about their high salary which does not reflect the average pharmacist's experience. Boasting one's pride does not help anyone, especially someone thinking about their lifetime career.

Or go to a few pharmacies and try to speak to pharmacists for their experience.

So would you recommend avoiding doing pharmacy altogether? I’d love to work in the regulatory environment but I know that’s hard to get into
If I was able to get the grades for medicine, I would have picked that to be honest but then again, the pharmacy course itself is interesting

Your post from a week ago says you work in a clothes shop?

"I was working in a fish and chip shop for a week or so and I hated it, crazy long shifts and I was left on my own when it was busy. I left and now I work in a clothes shop and I like it much better."

Trust me, the vast majority of pharmacists I meet in my neck of the woods totally enjoy their jobs. I know a few who work almost 100 hour as self employed week on week off earning vast sums and proud to be a pharmacist. I met a few pharmacists who qualified in the UK but currently live in Spain and France, come here to work flat out for 3 months and go stay with their family abroad for 3 months and then repeat the cycle again.

In my opinion, pharmacy is the creme-de-la-creme of all the healthcare professions. Medicine is only profitable when you become a consultant. Pharmacy is profitable from day one of qualification.

Your future colleagues are not ''cry babies''. They are deep thinkers who have freely chosen not to swallow hook line and sinker the negativity about pharmacy peddled by people like yourselves. Just because they do not agree with your negative point of view doesn't make them ''cry babies''.

Any pharmacist who chooses to work something approaching 100 hours a week shouldn’t be a pharmacist. And how many hours commuting to add onto this figure?

It is dangerous and totally irresponsible. Impossible to maintain anything approaching 100% concentration on the important tasks with so little sleep and down time.

Ethically almost the same as turning up to work drunk.

Do some work experience in your local chemist.

Pharmacy isn't a bad career per se but it drags down a lot of people who work in it. You can work in hospital, community, GP surgery and industry. Most of the complaints come from community pharmacy because you're essentially a glorified shop keeper. A large portion of patients don't appreciate a pharmacist's role and wages have stagnated for the last 20 years.

The last point is especially important with dissatisfaction. There's one person on here who boasts about their high salary which does not reflect the average pharmacist's experience. Boasting one's pride does not help anyone, especially someone thinking about their lifetime career.

Or go to a few pharmacies and try to speak to pharmacists for their experience