Poor Pharmacist Career Prospects? What do Universities tell you?

try mcdonalds in oxford street

but in seriousness, community pharmacy is a load of **** and whilst Im annoyed I am not getting much work/money (both parents unemployed and I am essentially helping them out) I am so glad I am not working due to the hatred I have for community pharmacy.

sad reality is that applications for jobs, unis, etc isnt all year round / can start anytime so I am literally playing a waiting game for god knows how long (essentially postgrad pharmacy courses, certain GEM schools and jobs / other avenues require me to be a registered pharmacist for 2 years before applying to them...I have only been a registered pharmacist for 16 months as of tomorrow - 8 months to go...)

I think every pharmacist I've talked to, hates their job. It's amazing. I mean the only solution is to increase staff numbers and increase pay in pharmacy. Then you might get some kind of retention.

How regular are your locum shifts?

answers to both questions:
2nd one - quite irregular, sometimes I get swamped with work (last year october and 1st 2 weeks november, as well as ramadan were 6 days a week working 8-12 hours a week), other times you can go months without work (I had to wait 5 months after becoming a registered pharmacist before I got locum work; had no work between between mid december and mid february). currently I have a few days booked for march but that is it till september atm. sadly I have only worked for 71 days as a pharmacist in 16 months (75 by end of month providing no cancellations).

1st question - depends on the pharmacist. personally I am the sort of person who likes the clinical nitty gritty stuff (diagnosis and treatment, med reviews, audits etc) and am a bit creative /like expressing myself so absolutely hate community as it represents everything I cant tolerate. although I will agree those who are into community would benefit from increased staff and wages (weekend locumming I am ok with). sad reality is that the amount pharmacies get paid by the NHS will be lowered by ~40% which means realistically only the big chains will survive and a lot of indies will go out of business. because big companies are all about profit, they are likely to reduce wages further (a mate of mine who used to be an area manager for a large chain of pharmacies in essex told me that she wouldnt be surprised if cetain places will employ pharmacists at close to minimum wage) and restrict staff numbers further.

what is strange however is that a few dispensers I know are getting 1800-2200/month after taxes working at independents, whereas a lot of pharmacists I know are earning less than them. at the end of the day, I guess its where you work/who you work for

What area is your grad scheme in?
I'm also interested in grad schemes (looking st audit/tax) but first doing pre-reg as I might as well.

Im doing tech Consulting.

But if you want to do the pre reg then by all means go ahead

1. There is not guarantee you will pass pre reg exam first time. GPhc are trying their level best to make the exam as hard as possible to churn out pre regs who will fail not registered ( Artificial reduction in pharmacist numbers)

2. Even if the grad schemes didnt work out, the way its going Pharmacists are going to only get paid £10-15/hour in the coming years which is basically what an unqualified store manager in a supermarket gets. 5 years of a degree to get this? SO essentially by registering as a pharmacist you will keep paying the GPHc fees every year to be used as slave labour for chains and supermarkets.

3. If I could get into the Big 4 from the uni i come from in an area totally 180 degrees from my field then anyone can! Its about tailoring your application to what THEY WANT and be confident and passionate about working for them. a bit of hard work now and grafting now to get the job means that if u get the job along with the progression you will get the perks as a professional. Compared that to working in a small supermarket room for the rest of your life on £15 an hour and treated like dirt by everyone.

Food for thought?

I think what a lot of pharmacists lack is saving and investment knowledge. Sure I may get £8 an hour as a dispenser, but I have the knowledge to throw that money in the stock market and multiply what I have.

The S&P 500 (measure of US economy in general) has returned 6.5% a year for the last 100 years or so on average. This includes buying the bad companies as well. If you can get 6.5% in the stock market, why would you be playing around with 0.2% bank accounts. If you don't need money in the next 5 years, it should be sitting in the market. If you have the knowledge you can pick out great companies, learn metrics, learn what a dividend cover is, what a P/E, P/B ratio is.

You will easily then return 10-15% a year (if not more). I have managed 18% in the last 6 months.

That is very true! another friend of mine who works in a different Big 4 firm, learnt about stocks and shares while in university and he's made a few bob from it in a couple of years!

Pharmacists and pharmacy students are in a bubble where they are unhappy with their lives but not the motivation to have a ' right sod you all Im leaving' attitude

Im doing tech Consulting.

But if you want to do the pre reg then by all means go ahead

1. There is not guarantee you will pass pre reg exam first time. GPhc are trying their level best to make the exam as hard as possible to churn out pre regs who will fail not registered ( Artificial reduction in pharmacist numbers)

2. Even if the grad schemes didnt work out, the way its going Pharmacists are going to only get paid £10-15/hour in the coming years which is basically what an unqualified store manager in a supermarket gets. 5 years of a degree to get this? SO essentially by registering as a pharmacist you will keep paying the GPHc fees every year to be used as slave labour for chains and supermarkets.

3. If I could get into the Big 4 from the uni i come from in an area totally 180 degrees from my field then anyone can! Its about tailoring your application to what THEY WANT and be confident and passionate about working for them. a bit of hard work now and grafting now to get the job means that if u get the job along with the progression you will get the perks as a professional. Compared that to working in a small supermarket room for the rest of your life on £15 an hour and treated like dirt by everyone.

Food for thought?

That is very true! another friend of mine who works in a different Big 4 firm, learnt about stocks and shares while in university and he's made a few bob from it in a couple of years!

Pharmacists and pharmacy students are in a bubble where they are unhappy with their lives but not the motivation to have a ' right sod you all Im leaving' attitude

I am in a sod you all position, slight problem is that my parents are both EAPs (both pensioners <60 years old) and due to their idiocy regarding certain financial matters (and the fact they had to re-mortgage our house to put me through my last year at uni due to idiot student finance cutting everything off and not paying me what they owed till 2 weeks after I graduated), I am not in a position where I can up and leave straight away.

Where did you study pharmacy?

Id prefer not to say which one (the only clue ill give is that the uni is a russell group uni in the top 25 unis in the UK (overall & pharmacy) / 400 worldwide).

School of Pharmacy, UCL?

Like I said, Id prefer not to say as I can be identified (although I will say UCLSOP is heavily overrated based on virtually all UCLSOP alum I have come across /revision material and seminars written/held by UCL SOP lecturers

It used to be called the London School of Pharmacy, until UCL butchered it.

yh, a lot of LSOP alum really hate UCL for some reason. but tbh a lot of these prestige unis are all talk these days (all subjects, not just pharmacy) and their main points are a) research and b) prestige = more money.

Indeed. I think a lot of pharmacists and ex-pharmacists feel they have been conned, almost sold a pup when they wanted a dog. I mean you only realise how bad pharmacy is once you step into one as a RP, by then it's too late.

I think it should be law for pharmacy students to have had work experience in pharmacy before starting the MPharm degree. Then they can experience it for themselves.

I think what a lot of pharmacists lack is saving and investment knowledge. Sure I may get £8 an hour as a dispenser, but I have the knowledge to throw that money in the stock market and multiply what I have.

The S&P 500 (measure of US economy in general) has returned 6.5% a year for the last 100 years or so on average. This includes buying the bad companies as well. If you can get 6.5% in the stock market, why would you be playing around with 0.2% bank accounts. If you don't need money in the next 5 years, it should be sitting in the market. If you have the knowledge you can pick out great companies, learn metrics, learn what a dividend cover is, what a P/E, P/B ratio is.

You will easily then return 10-15% a year (if not more). I have managed 18% in the last 6 months.

Definitely. I agree!. A lot of people (including myself) signed up for this course having not a clue what a pharmacist does on a daily basis and what the job entails. I honestly did not know what I wanted to do, medicine sounded cool but with average GCSEs and AS levels that was out of the picture.
I can't even remember what made me consider pharmacy, but I bought into the rubbish the universities were selling us at open days. 'Dispensing' sounded like the coolest thing in the world. Now that I am in 3rd year & have had a lot of experience, I have realised a lot of it was sugar coated BS.

I have always said that your career is what you make it. It's ok to change your mind and reroute yourself. The worst thing you can ever do is play victim!.