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Original post by velvetsky
Nurses don't work night shifts?


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Of course they work night shifts, don't be silly. Do you think patients lose whatever condition they have after they go to sleep and resume their normal life in the morning, such that their supervision is not required between 10 pm to 6 am?
Original post by InadequateJusticex
Of course they work night shifts, don't be silly. Do you think patients lose whatever condition they have after they go to sleep and resume their normal life in the morning, such that their supervision is not required between 10 pm to 6 am?


With a mother who has been working as a nurse for over 20 years of course I know nurses work night shifts. I won't bother writing a response to the rest of your post, Have a nice day.


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(edited 7 years ago)
http://73a.d36.myftpupload.com/2016/05/future-funding-of-community-pharmacy/

An interesting read, which summarizes what the pharmacy cuts are (and what they may mean).

Note: This is very important for those looking to study Pharmacy - who are still (exasperatingly) being told about our bright clinical future - these cuts appear directed at services performed in a community pharmacy setting, or at the very least, will indirectly affect them. In particular, the governing-powers that be are looking to do backpeddle on services such as MURs and NMS, as well as trying to scale back on how often dispensing fees are being paid (which may have a knock-on effect as to how often you're seeing individual patients).

I know this thread has derailed a bit into the disgruntled Pharmacist complaining forum, but I don't think anyone has stopped to point out what these cuts will mean for current and future students; with companies abusing the very schemes set out to help patients, the government is almost certainly looking to direct pharmacy funding back into the NHS, which will call the exact role of the community pharmacist even further into question. What exactly is our point? If it's to be more than a clinical and accuracy checking machine, why is the requisite funding being taken away? Why are we increasingly being expected to do more with even less?

The yarn I was sold - that I was to become the vanguard of minor ailments, swooping in to save GPs from frivilous appointments - hasn't quite made it's way into reality yet, and these cuts will certainly impede our ability to provide critical services (which will put the strain back onto GPs, naturally). In any case, the government have quite clearly gotten cold feet about redefining the role of community pharmacists to be more clinically-focused, and the confusion as to what our place in the NHS actually is will continue.

In fairness though, I can't really complain about the GP Pharmacist scheme (at least, not until something goes tangibly wrong with it). Honestly, I think Pharmacists can do far more good working directly for the NHS - where patient interests truly come first - rather than as a puppet which curtails to a large corporation's needs (which, sadly, is what community pharmacy is fast turning into). Perhaps this is against my better judgement, but I am cautiously optimistic.Time will tell I suppose.
Original post by nexttime
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Not to hijack this thread with non-pharmacy stuff, but

1. I guess I've only ever known the BMA to be an effective union. Whatever its past indiscretions, I guarantee you it was better able to represent its members than anything the pharmacists have access to

2. Yes, I've seen them. Isn't there some sort of fail safe mechanism whereby they can offer higher rates if nobody takes the hourly capped jobs? Either way, £20-25 per hour is more or less the highest a pharmacist could earn locuming regardless of seniority or experience. Doctors locum rates at least rise with experience

3. I'll tell you this right now, hospital pharmacists are much less busy than community pharmacists. When I trained in hospital I had at least 3 tea breaks each day. Whilst locuming in community I regularly worked anything from 9-12 hours without stopping to empty bladder or bowels

4. Ha, nights. I've never done one outside of A&E or labour ward. I know we're supposed to do them during final year but we'll see about that
Original post by Caponester
Not to hijack this thread with non-pharmacy stuff, but

1. I guess I've only ever known the BMA to be an effective union. Whatever its past indiscretions, I guarantee you it was better able to represent its members than anything the pharmacists have access to

2. Yes, I've seen them. Isn't there some sort of fail safe mechanism whereby they can offer higher rates if nobody takes the hourly capped jobs? Either way, £20-25 per hour is more or less the highest a pharmacist could earn locuming regardless of seniority or experience. Doctors locum rates at least rise with experience

3. I'll tell you this right now, hospital pharmacists are much less busy than community pharmacists. When I trained in hospital I had at least 3 tea breaks each day. Whilst locuming in community I regularly worked anything from 9-12 hours without stopping to empty bladder or bowels

4. Ha, nights. I've never done one outside of A&E or labour ward. I know we're supposed to do them during final year but we'll see about that


Hi,

Quick question from a hospital pharmacy enthusiast: do the locum rates vary between community and hospital, and do the locum rates within hospital increase with experience, e.g. band 6 vs band 8a/b or something like that?

Thanks!
Original post by thegodofgod
Hi,

Quick question from a hospital pharmacy enthusiast: do the locum rates vary between community and hospital, and do the locum rates within hospital increase with experience, e.g. band 6 vs band 8a/b or something like that?

Thanks!


Can't give you an exact answer i'm afraid, but a friend of mine at medical school worked summers as a hospital pharmacist in England for around £30 an hour. Not too sure if he was locuming or on a short term contract though. Probably the former.

I'm really not too sure how 'in demand' hospital pharmacist locums are. I didn't see a single one whilst doing my pre-registration in a large English hospital with about 50 pharmacists employed.

If you can get to band 8a as a hospital pharmacist you'll be laughing. Working a 37.5 hour week with 5.2 weeks holiday and no weekends for £38,500 last time I checked. It's what I'd aim for if still in the profession.
Original post by Caponester
Can't give you an exact answer i'm afraid, but a friend of mine at medical school worked summers as a hospital pharmacist in England for around £30 an hour. Not too sure if he was locuming or on a short term contract though. Probably the former.

I'm really not too sure how 'in demand' hospital pharmacist locums are. I didn't see a single one whilst doing my pre-registration in a large English hospital with about 50 pharmacists employed.

If you can get to band 8a as a hospital pharmacist you'll be laughing. Working a 37.5 hour week with 5.2 weeks holiday and no weekends for £38,500 last time I checked. It's what I'd aim for if still in the profession.



I dont see £38K is justified for someone doing a 5 year tough course and working up the bands to earn that much.

A band 8/9 nurse would earn much more than that so either your figure is incorrect or of it isnt then its a disgrace. A newly qualified pharmacist after pre reg can earn £35-40000 in community.
Original post by RealisticPharm
As a Bath 2010 MPharm graduate who worked as a community Pharmacist, then as a Clinical Pharmacist before now working for a local CCG, I ended up at an unnamed Pharmacy school whilst it was doing one of it's tours to prospective students.

The information that was being presented to students was completely inaccurate regarding the current state of the job market, especially for newly qualified Pharmacists.

When I started as a fresher in 2006, the new Pharmacy NHS contract had just been introduced which shifted money away from dispensing and towards 'services', the idea being that Pharmacists would swoop in and take a huge amount of workload off the NHS. This was sold heavily to me as a student, and at the time I believed that Community Pharmacy (which is where most graduates end up, if you're reading this the odds are you will be working in a Boots rather than a hospital, and very, very unlikely to be 'industry':wink: would become an increasingly clinical environment.

That hasn't happened, and I've seen the growing realisation amongst the profession over the last 5 years that the future is not bright for Pharmacy as a whole. This culminated recently with this pretty stark bit of news -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-35418556

http://www.theguardian.com/healthcare-network/views-from-the-nhs-frontline/2016/feb/01/pharmacists-meant-face-nhs-now-jobs-at-risk

The Government intends to close 25% of Community Pharmacies by 2020 (i.e. just when you'll be graduating). For a raft of reasons I wont get into unless anyone here asks, it's widely agreed that the vision of Pharmacy providing 'services' is now pretty much dead. Remote dispensing via robotics is almost certain to become the norm in the next two years (again, this is the governments stated plan for Pharmacy) and so the reality is likely to be 25% of Community Pharmacists unemployed by 2020, and quite probably a change in the law surrounding the 'Responsible Pharmacist' legislation to mean that in the 75% of remaining locations, a Pharmacist will no longer need to be present.

To cut to the point, I was interested to hear about the Pharmacy school member of staff would answer questions regarding the future of the profession. It's so uniformly bleak, with anyone who is able to fleeing the profession, and without a hint of the unity and determination shown by the BMA and junior doctors - that I felt sorry for this person who would have to try and address what I assumed would be some pretty tough questions about why anyone would invest £40,000 in a Pharmacy degree, only to graduate in 2020 and find themselves competing with people with a huge volume of experienced Pharmacists desperate for work.

I was shocked to say the least to hear her answer some fairly bland questions about the role of Pharmacists in the future with the same bland, vague promises of a 'clinical future' that I had heard 10 years ago, and which were now very much dispelled. I was even more staggered to hear some of the prospective students talking about how 'You'd start on £45k' (you wont, you'd start on £33k IF you got an offer after pre-reg at all. This is down from £40k 5 years ago when I graduated, which in turn was down from £44k when I signed up. Don't forget that with inflation salaries are supposed to INCREASE. Adjusted for inflation starting salaries for a graduate who has just finished pre-reg training have dropped 25%, thus was simply due to over supply from graduates alone, at a time when the number of Pharmacies opening was increasing rapidly. It will drop MUCH harder over the next 5 years)

Are you potential, future Pharmacists aware of the future of the profession you're investing so heavily into? Do you read websites like the Chemist and Druggist, where there are forums of current, practising Pharmacists, or is the only information any A-Level student has what they receive from a University prospectus? I don't want to alarm or upset anyone, if anything the unfortunate ones are people like me who started their careers at exactly the wrong time. Just as the profession was going over the precipice, just in time for us to start having financial obligations which make retraining much more difficult.

I can believe that someone might want to go into Pharmacy today despite having their eyes open to their likely career prospects. However you don't need to spend too long with most Pharmacy applicants until you get to the 'How much money do you earn?' question, and rightly so. It was something I was concerned with, I wanted the middle class lifestyle for my children that my parents offered me, and I imagine that was the desire of almost all of my peers. Pharmacist is unlikely to be a middle class profession by 2020 - everyone who is applying is at least aware of this projected future, right?


Very Interesting!
I myself was swayed into the pharmacy route after having not done so well in my AS Grades last year - I'm now retaking and plan to apply for 2017 entry. Originally, I wished to pursue medicine and arguably still wish to; I feel that the likelihood of me landing with a job after the degree is more probable, plus I feel the career route generally shows much more variation and is more 'patient treatment' based whereas pharmacy (based on what I've seen on placements etc) seems slightly bland and quite frankly, I couldn't see myself doing it for the rest of my life.
Arguably, the competition of medicine/ dentistry degree's has increased so much in the last 10 years or so that students, like myself, are now being pushed into other careers as a means of insurance, consequently resulting in the oversaturation of graduates for careers such as pharmacy; Universities and articles provide different information to students, some claiming that there are still jobs and others no, consequently resulting in students being left confused about whether or not they should apply.
Original post by sachinisgod
I dont see £38K is justified for someone doing a 5 year tough course and working up the bands to earn that much.

A band 8/9 nurse would earn much more than that so either your figure is incorrect or of it isnt then its a disgrace. A newly qualified pharmacist after pre reg can earn £35-40000 in community.


Whether it's justified or not is irrelevant. Do you understand how banding works under the agenda for change system? A band 8 or 9 nurse will earn exactly the same as a band 8 or 9 pharmacist.

Salary has slightly improved from when I last checked (about 5 years ago), but allow me to present you with evidence of the wage of a band 8a pharmacist working for the NHS (£40,028 per year)

https://www.jobs.nhs.uk/xi/vacancy/cb16d0fbb748589b14730c4c2a1f4b55/?vac_ref=914171221

Keep in mind that to reach band 8a, you will first need to do your pre-registration year followed by a minimum of two years (most will do 3 years at this stage) of band 6 work. Promotion to band 7 usually results in a semi-stable job lasting for around 5 or 6 years (often longer) before you are ready to apply for band 8a. So, best case scenario, we're talking a decade after graduation from uni before you earn £40,000 each year.

£40,000 in the community after qualification? What the **** are you smoking? The best deal I've ever heard of was £37,500 per year for a newly qualified pharmacist working an average of 45 hour weeks and 3/4 Saturdays.
Original post by Caponester
I think the prospects for pharmacists are different from doctors in a number of ways but I also think the prospects of community pharmacists are somewhat different from hospital pharmacists. In my opinion, there are 3 key reasons why doctors won't ever be treated as badly as community pharmacists currently are or will be in future

1. We are a very publicly recognisable profession and have managed to maintain the support of the general public throughout this dispute. Pharmacists just don't have the same profile or elicit the same 'warm fuzzy feeling' as doctors do. I think some of that fuzziness has worn off doctors, but enough remains so as to prevent the government completely hammering us. There are still many people who under appreciate the role of the community pharmacist and that isn't helped by the inability to put pharmacists on the public agenda (see point 2)

2. Our union has it's act together and our royal colleges are moderately powerful lobbyists in parliament. The same cannot be said about the PDA and RPS despite best efforts. The PDA is small, has nobody to speak for it in government, and seems to have quite a confused role (sort of acting as a lobby whilst providing professional indemnity like a BMA-MDU hybrid) whilst the RPS is in complete disarray trying desperately to follow the medical/nursing college model and failing to attract membership. Bottom line, the BMA defends us in an effective and coordinated manner, and because of that, has very high membership rates

3. We are essentially employees of the government, which essentially makes us civil servants (yes, even self-employed GP's are indirectly in the civil service). Because we are employed by the state the government has a monopoly over us but the public is also generally made aware of when things change. Pharmacists, being employees of the various pharmacy mega corporations, are at the mercy of off shore board rooms full of people who will ruthlessly implement the necessary cuts as per NHS cut backs. This additional layer of middle management between you and the tax payer is just enough to hide some truly atrocious working conditions/pay cuts etc from public view. I think that's why the recent Guardian article about Boots came as such a shock to the public - they have absolutely no idea how you guys are being shafted and who is perpetrating said shafting!

Quick word on community vs hospital pharmacists. I think with the inevitable pivot towards fully functional 7 day services we are going to see hospital pharmacists working weekends as per normal. Whether or not this includes the full range of clinical services or not remains to be seen, but as a bare minimum there will have to be a fully staffed inpatient dispensary with aseptic services and a medicines information department. This will all have to be staffed on the same budget as a 5 day pharmacy service. So in this respect, the prospects of hospital pharmacists are closely intertwined with that of the junior doctors and all other hospital based healthcare professions. I think they will be safe, but they can expect to work longer and harder for less money in future. This should be troubling considering last time I checked, hospital pharmacists were paid a pittance!





I've shamefully lost touch with many people I studied MPharm with but I actually think a few of our high achievers have stuck it out in community pharmacy! At least one of them is a relatively successful hospital pharmacist in Scotland at the moment whilst others have began to move up the slippery pole in community and at least one other has a job working a medicines management type job in primary care. However, I do broadly agree. There are at least 6 pharmacists in my year in medical school and I don't think any of us went into pharmacy as 'failed medics'. Therefore, I think it's perfectly reasonable to suggest that we might have remained in the profession if things weren't about to go off the cliff.

I remember one of my last locum shifts before coming off the GPhC register was working in Morrisons supermarket on a Sunday. Just me and a few weekend staff, all pharmacy students in there 2nd or 3rd years. Got talking to the 3rd year student and she told me the state of play for students getting a hold of summer placements. Apparently community pharmacy chains had scaled back on the number of job offers they were making for summer students and prospects were grim for securing employment if you didn't get one of the 170 funded NES places in Scotland (so to do the math here, that's 170 places for about 300 Scottish pharmacy graduates with the rest left to tackle the various English routes). I was also told that hospitals expected students to volunteer over summer instead of get paid and that supermarkets would send people to the middle of nowhere. It all just sounded so different to what I went through only about 4 or 5 years previous. Christ knows what it's like now.



It is tough getting hold of a summer placement, particularly with chains. Most have an assessment type questionnaire that assesses your retail knowledge.I applied for a placement with a chain starting with B and rhyming with hoots and I remember one question was asking what you would do if a customer returned nail clippers which they had lost a receipt for:angry::colonhash:. That's the reality. 'MPharm'? , more like MBusiness. Then you get to spend 2 weeks walking up and down a hot dispensary.

Hospital is a different story, consider yourself lucky if you get a response from the hospital.Most ask for 3rd year students only and state that preference will be given to 3rd years, however there are a few that accept 1st & 2nd years. I got ignored from all the hospitals I applied to (2nd year) and only got one response and they offered me an interview.

Everything is uncertain but all you have to do is put the certainty into the situation. Nothing is handed to you on a silver platter.
Original post by velvetsky
.I applied for a placement with a chain starting with B and rhyming with hoots and I remember one question was asking what you would do if a customer returned nail clippers which they had lost a receipt for:angry::colonhash:. That's the reality. 'MPharm'? , more like MBusiness. Then you get to spend 2 weeks walking up and down a hot dispensary.


Nail clippers cost £2.65 (http://www.boots.com/en/Boots-Pharmaceuticals-Toe-Nail-Clippers-1-Pair-_1154830/).

Let me guess, if you allowed the customer a full refund - costing Boots a whole several pounds :eek: - that obviously means you are clinically incompetent and useless as a pharmacist. Get out.

What complete and utter *******. Again, goes to show that it doesn't matter how much you know or how good you are at your job, in community, what matters is your ability to toe the line and make a spreadsheet look good to some shareholders hundreds of miles away.

Do they still make you take psychometric tests? We were extensively told there was 'no right answer', but obviously, they were there to eek out rule breakers. Hmmm... do I follow the procedure exactly as I was told, or do I come up with a creative, more efficient way of doing things...?

Why the former, obviously! :rolleyes:
Pharmacy is an excellent degree, but as things currently stand in community pharmacy, with 6% cuts and up to 3000 pharmacy closures, choosing it and being one of the 60-70% of pharmacy graduates who end up in that sector, now makes this degree choice a gamble or possibly even unwise? Discuss.

(open to 6th formers preferably)
Original post by thegodofgod
Hi,

Quick question from a hospital pharmacy enthusiast: do the locum rates vary between community and hospital, and do the locum rates within hospital increase with experience, e.g. band 6 vs band 8a/b or something like that?

Thanks!


Locum rates are now capped at 55% on top of basic hourly wage for that band.

Eg Bank band 6 would earn £14.97 an hour, whereas a locum pharmacist after paying agency fees would earn £19-20 per hour. However, take into account no pension contributions etc and it's almost not worth the hassle.

Higher bands can be roughly calculated using the 55% rule. Take about £5/hour off for agency fees.
Original post by MiloMilo
Locum rates are now capped at 55% on top of basic hourly wage for that band.

Eg Bank band 6 would earn £14.97 an hour, whereas a locum pharmacist after paying agency fees would earn £19-20 per hour. However, take into account no pension contributions etc and it's almost not worth the hassle.

Higher bands can be roughly calculated using the 55% rule. Take about £5/hour off for agency fees.


really band 6 hospital pharmacists get paid £14.97 a hour? not great is it?
Original post by trustmeimlying1
really band 6 hospital pharmacists get paid £14.97 a hour? not great is it?


Sounds about right. Band 6 starts around 25k


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OMG! I heard this from the few that attended the BPSA conference. 2017??? I was hoping for 2019!. Lol We are finished!!.😳


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I am currently a pre-reg pharmacist in community with my other half of placement in hospital. I certainly feel that the degree is worth it at the end. You learn so much after graduating.

The problem is that public and NHS do not value pharmacist as much as they value other healthcare professionals. This has meant that NHS look into pharmacy first to make any sort of cuts. Nurses are more respected than pharmacist even though we spend the same number of years learning as doctors. I personally blame the dysfunctional NHS system. Its a system allocates meaningless funding for wasteful commissioning services such as needle exchange.

The jobs are becoming more scarced in pharmacy due to the rise in pharmacist eapecially in London. I certainly feel the only way to earn big in pharmacy is by locum work and doing shifts most people won't be prepared to do. Hospital pharmacist are poorly paid and they work you very hard and the clinical diploma is very difficult. Moving up the bands are not easy either as there are a lot of competition for places. So essentially you could be stuck with 25k-30k for the next 6-7 years as a hospital pharmacist whereas regular locum work will yield about 40k per year.

Best advice is to look at industry e.g. astrazeneca, gsk,Pfizer and norvamentis. Or any other small industrial firms as there are better chances of earning bigger money in the future. E.g I'm thinking of becoming a QP, qualified person. Its probably the most boring job on the world but if you can get into industry as a pharmacist and work in manufacturing and batch controls. The training for it can be less than 3 years and you can be commanding 40k-50k. QP is a very niche role and there are quite a lot of demand for it all the time. After several years of experience, you can start commanding higher salaries of between 70-80k and even break 100k barrier after about 20 years. Other roles may include working as a patent attorney,although they are really competitive and they tend to not value pharmacist applying. They although are a bit elitist too. They cherry pick from Oxford and Cambridge graduates with rubbish degrees like zoology which no knowledge of patents and drug/device formulation and design. Yet it is still worth a try.
Honestly guys ive been qualified for nearly 3 years now , i started pharmacy in 2008 and graduated in 2012 , i must say it has been a mistake and not a career decision i would recommend to anyone else on the planet never mind in this forum , i am posting after around 7 years if you can see my timeline you will know im not just scaremongering but enough is enough.
This proffesion is based on lies , corrupt capitalistic companys who basically want to maximise their profits and even put the legality issues to a side when it comes to benefitting patients and improving healthcare.
Companies such as the big multiples employ non pharmacist managers who albeit "boss" the pharmacist and dont understand the healthcare aspect they just understand the targets , ive been managed by barmaids who have literally shouted at me for querying a prescription with a patient because it was taking too long to check the other medication for the other patients.

I know amongst certain cultural families pharmacists are seen as a very respectable proffesional but now isnt the time where people should be bothered about the reputation of what people think about their proffesion especially with Brexit being announced i think people need to be a lot wiser with their choices especially career choices and i wouldnt recomend pharmacy to anyone.

Lastly the best part is the reduction of rates compared with other proffesions such as Optometry , only yesterday Tesco Pharmacy announced that they would reduce their rates from £21 to £18 a hour , this is frankly a absolute joke especially if you are a locum because this doesnt cover the true cost of living if you have a family to feed , indemnity insurance etc, petrol prices , food , inflation.

I am posting this because i need to help make you all aware to speak to my self i am a pharmacist who is a locum i get to see all different types of company rates and working habits as i work frankly everywhere and that isnt a lot of places with the new number of pharmacists that have come out by the way and i can speak the truth which is pharmacy is definentely not the proffesion it was 10-20 years ago so please dont waste your lifes as youll be guaranteed to regret it, yes youll have a masters degree but what good is it if your being bossed about by non pharmacy managers who have been gainig their managerial experience as barmaids and are used to shouting last orders but this time to patients to get their medication in which is frankly disgusting and if it doesnt pay the bills what good is all the knowledge.
Trust me 6 formers or others dont let anyone tell you otherwise , dm me for any advice
That wouldn't be so painful if you didn't have to be indebted for it. That's the reality of it. Most of us accept the job market is highly competitive these days. If you don't have to take on debt and you dont get the job, its not as bad because you're financially free.