Is optometry a good career/course to do?

Pharmacy is saturated?, you're guaranteed jobs after both degrees. You are required to complete a compulsory training placement (pre-registration) where you are supervised and assessed. If you are successful, you start working full-time. Unemployment rates for Pharmacists are low, along with Optometrists, Dentists and Doctors

Not 100% sure about Optom, but I can tell you to AVOID Pharmacy!!!!!! - its becoming a **** show.

Again i'm not 100% sure, but Optom sounds decent to me.

I didn't explain myself well sorry. I was worried that for the time put into the course for pharmacy, the salary isn't worth it. Don't get me wrong the salary is good but i'm worried that they may fall in the future due to so many pharmacists graduating every year.

Yes, you're right. The pay for Pharmacists working in the NHS is low and progression is slow, but you can work in the private sector. My brother is 31 and is a manager in a Pharmacy, he's earning over 50k working privately. The hours are longer and you work harder obviously, but you can earn almost twice as much. Mind you, Optometry is a good career too. I know several people working as optometrists for Specsavers, they earn good money and live a comfortable life.

I can't speak for pharmacists but I can speak on behalf of some optoms. Both careers have equal job satisfaction and both professionals live 'decent' lives. However, pharmacy is a four year course with pre reg (5 years) and optometry is a 3 year course with pre reg (4 years) with the basic salary of an optom being slightly higher than pharmacists in many cases. A reason for this is optoms take on more responsiblity than pharmacists. Generally, optom is more stressful than pharmacy as you have to meet certain demands (sales targets, sight tests in a day, more clinical etc.) both careers allow you open your own practice which is great if you want to start your own business but as you said, both markets are starting to become significantly saturated. especially since multiples (eg. spescavers) dominate the optom market so starting your own practice may be more difficult for optoms than pharmacists. If you're looking at the financial side of things, both jobs allow locuming (define:locum- a person who stands in temporarily for someone else of the same profession, especially a cleric or doctor.) so there is potential to earn a lot of money in both professions. That being said, there are more pharmacy schools in the UK than optom schools hence, more pharmacists = less locum jobs. But you shouldn't stress too much about the money right now because ultimately, if you don't have a passion in something you will get bored very quickly. I know people from both professions whom are bored of their jobs. Both jobs are highly repetitive with pharmacy being more mundane so you have to be extremely patient if you want to take this career path. Also NHS work will always pay lower than private practice.
As for the optom course itself, if you enjoy maths, physics,biology and people, you'll love it! you get to do a lot of clinical practice in uni (practicing on peers and friends) but as I said it is quite repetitive. People often underestimate the amount of work you have to put into a degree and that is especially true of pharmacy. Someone once said to me "a pharmacy degree is hard but the job is easy. However, an optom degree is easy but the job is hard."

Hope this helps. good luck with your future

I really enjoy maths and biology (haven't done physics but at GCSE I loved it). I think optom is the better option because it takes less time and whilst being more stressful, it's more rewarding. Have you done an optom degree?

I'm in the middle of one

Hi
I'm a optom (qualified 6 years ago) been a locum ever since! More flexible and pay is better. Being an actual optom is not hard at all..it's basically all you learnt at uni. You get to see pathology now and then but it's mainly refraction! I love my job because i feel great that I can help people see better and also if you detect some problem in the eye, then you need to refer them and help them to get seen by doctor.

Hi. I love your positive comments. Now that you've been qualified for 12 years, do you have even more positive things to share about being an optometrist. Also how was your pre reg year? Was it horrible?