From being a pharmacy assistant to a pharmacy student

I wouldn’t say there is any “hate” towards pharmacy but some of us community pharmacists who have been in practice for a long time (40+ years for me) have seen the direction of travel and it is not upwards. Personally I am concerned that some Universities are exaggerating the prospects to fill their courses. They are businesses after all.
Community pharmacy is where the majority of pharmacy graduates find employment and for various reasons (Government funding being the most important) this sector is in a dire state.
Look at pay rates.
The “Chemist & Druggist” magazine reported on a survey towards the end of last year. The articles commented on the survey noted that community pharmacy locum rates in England had fallen by 11.9% over the previous year. Locum rates are very much indicative of the state of community pharmacy. England was home to the lowest recorded hourly rate of any UK city, the report said, with locums in London earning an average of just £25.38 per hour - a 6.6% decline on the previous year.
Could anyone have any sort of life London/South East on £25-26 /hr?
I had a pharmacy in 2010 and was paying my locums £27/hr. Today the same pharmacy under new ownership is paying £24/hr. 16 years of inflation to consider. The workload for the pharmacist and staff there has noticeably increased to the point where all are severely stressed. Do you see what I mean by direction of travel?
It important to note the fact there is little to no career progression in community pharmacy. You are likely to finish more or less where you started.
On a brighter note there are new opportunities for graduates in GP surgeries and clinical positions within the NHS. However there are 3+ new universities coming on line in the next few years with 100s of extra pharmacy graduates looking for employment. I do seriously doubt the new opportunities will offer all of them a satisfactory career.
I posted here on these topics in more detail 5-6 months ago if you are interested. “Current community pharmacy pay rates” & “Pharmacy: A cautionary warning”. Have a look.
Please do your research thoroughly before committing.
The same advice applies to any degree course. You have to be certain. Very certain.
Best of luck.

thanks for your advice, I am quite certain with my choice and I'm currently choosing my Firm but overall would you suggest pursuing a degree in pharm or not?

thanks for your advice, I am quite certain with my choice and I'm currently choosing my Firm but overall would you suggest pursuing a degree in pharm or not?

Hey I want to study pharmacy because I love organic chem, biology and more importantly to help people. Even though salary might not be the best in compare to med and dent, pharmacists have better work-life balance and its comparably a short degree. As a pharmacist you would know so much about med that you can help family members with their health issues and give advice which I find very rewarding.
I now have 4/4 offers and choosing my firm and hopefully become a pharmacy student soon
BTW why is there so much hate towards pharmacy? people say its not worth/ unbearably difficult /very low salary?

As a current pharmacist I can tell you pharmacy is not a shorter degree than you'd think compared to med. You do 4 years in uni then a hard pre reg plus that most of us had to do a master of prescribing essentially using 6 years to 7 of our life to get the degree. To add not everyone passes pre reg exam first time. Some don't even pass it on third attempt so it's not as easy as you think.
There is no single hate towards pharmacy but when you're in a sector where your leading body the GPhc doesn't help as much as needed and the NHS wants to destroy us from every corner by taking money from pharmacy owners and pharmacies and giving it back to medicine and hospitals that leaves most pharmacists and pharmacies being under paid. To add most pharmacies are paying more for meds now and you always have to keep up to date with tariff prices something uni doesn't teach you and other concepts you won't learn at uni for running a successful business. Consider also now that electricity prices are going up, council tax and rent for shops also up it means that it becomes harder to run your own business. Also licenses such as 100 HR pharmacies and online pharmacy licenses have been taken back by NHS meaning we as people cannot open a new pharmacy with average cash like old gen but need 500k to 600k to do so. To add jobs are more competitive and often people reject you without reason or lie on the reason even including PCNs. Imagine there is a national goal to increase Russel group admissions for these health courses till 2030 you can look that up. Meaning the job market will be even more over crowded and with more pharmacies closing for example a lot of boots sold out, Lloyds sold out to jhoots which also sold out shortly after.. meaning it's a big risk to take on owning a pharmacy especially since locums want higher wages meaning it often means if you own a business you're going to be left running it yourself even if you fall sick. Also the work life balance you suggested isn't true. You only say that as someone with less than 1 year experience in profession. Try being it for over 4 years to 6 years and saying the same. Pharmacist like myself have done shifts where we worked from 3pm till midnight or from morning 9am till 8pm... Or from 12pm till 8pm. Tell me does that leave you with much relaxation after work. Most doctors in a GP practice do the 9 to 5 and leave or max till 6. Also to add most of pharmacy and also medicine ie being a GP has now become paper work. You have more paper work than you have time for helping people. For example at end of month you need to scan 1000s of scripts and check if they signed and reorder meds for people etc..
Imagine back in the day my family member who is a pharmacist also bought a house in a very nice area for about 400k early 2000s this was now same house is worth 1.2 milli. The same has happened with pharmacy a guy who bought 5 pharmacies for 500k now has 5 times that value from those 5 pharmacies meaning it could go for upto 2.5 milli. With interest rates of 5 percent and above for the new gen Ie you and myself who I consider new gen even though I finished uni before COVID IE around 2018 to 2019 things get harder. Also considering you're going to qualify in 5 or 6 years time things will be even harder for you.
https://www.russellgroup.ac.uk/news/russell-group-sets-out-landmark-2030-commitment-help-build-healthier-communities. Here is the new health agenda which is set out. It means they want to make these degrees over populated so we do more services as if we are not already.. I work with another pharmacist and we struggle to keep up doing pharmacist first and emergency supplies plus the minor illness schemes and bp checks every other day... With regular pharmacy work.. it's hard since you have a form to fill out online which takes 10 to 20 mins.. even the discharge medicine service is a long process.
The sad thing is a physiotherapist may make as much as you even though they studied less years than you and are not required to stand long hrs. The same is true if you look at other professions such as IT.
Is it fair for someone like me who has a previously broken leg to be standing most the time even in my own business ?. When you want to sit patients always come in on you and you get little time to even eat.. also to add if you're closed for bank holiday or Easter Friday people complain and act like you're not allowed to take a break off as a pharmacist and should be there 24/7 without a holiday or life.
I know females whom have varicose veins or were pregnant made to stand at work. I know even my situation if I get leg pain in forced to stand. In places where I locked like boots often a store manager will manage you and remove your chair even though their not a pharmacist and in some businesses ie one I worked which was Indian run staff IE dispensers will have more power than you and you'll get the blame for asking them to work and not play music since they are close to the owner who is also from their country and they act as a spy for that owner. That's pharmacy you will tell a person to dispense something according to brand they might not and they will not get in trouble since the owner of pharmacy agrees. As a prescriber it's worse unless you work in your own business since often you'll be told to do prescribing for meds you don't want to do for cash for an owner whom won't care when the GPhc comes saying hi on your door for your errors of prescribing.

Hello, we just had a convo in the other thread haha.
Thanks for your advice again and I now fully understand challanges of pharmacy.
You have been a great messenger to deliver your POV to pharmacy students/aspires but some times in life people make mistakes and you only fully understand when you are in it, there are 2 possibilities, you walk away from profession, get a normal job like others/ try other sectors of pharm or the other option is you can manage.
By the way you are talking I could feel that you have been in this profession for very long time and maybe for first 10 years pharmacy wasn’t as bad ? So maybe I can “waste” few years of my life to follow my passion ( which time would go anywhere and no matter my job I’ll be 30/40) and if I didn’t like it after 10 years pharmacy, at least I gave it a try and I won’t regret it because I still worked and got paid ( so I wasn’t unemployed) and I have time applying to other jobs while working.
Btw from now on all Pharm graduates will be independent prescribers so a lil shorter journey ig.
I am cautious about pharm now but I want to make this mistake so I could learn it my self, as unless I experience it my 18 years old brain dont believes it.
Thanks for all of your support and sorry if it looks like I ignored your advice but I will promise not to go the usual root ( community) and try as hard as I can to get jobs in other sectors ( industry, GP/ Hospital).

Hi @Elaraaa !
You mentioned that you're cautious about pharmacy now, can you please tell me a little bit more about your concerns?
-Robbynz (Kingston Rep) ☺️

Hi so my main concern was so many pharmacists were very negative about the profession saying its bad/not worth it/run if you can etc I wanted to know if do you think its the case or not?
However, I LOVE pharmacy and I want to pursue very very much, but these comments kinda suck and make me bit scared about future of pharmacy and how so many people say that the pay is bad and I shouldn't go to community?

Hello, we just had a convo in the other thread haha.
Thanks for your advice again and I now fully understand challanges of pharmacy.
You have been a great messenger to deliver your POV to pharmacy students/aspires but some times in life people make mistakes and you only fully understand when you are in it, there are 2 possibilities, you walk away from profession, get a normal job like others/ try other sectors of pharm or the other option is you can manage.
By the way you are talking I could feel that you have been in this profession for very long time and maybe for first 10 years pharmacy wasn’t as bad ? So maybe I can “waste” few years of my life to follow my passion ( which time would go anywhere and no matter my job I’ll be 30/40) and if I didn’t like it after 10 years pharmacy, at least I gave it a try and I won’t regret it because I still worked and got paid ( so I wasn’t unemployed) and I have time applying to other jobs while working.
Btw from now on all Pharm graduates will be independent prescribers so a lil shorter journey ig.
I am cautious about pharm now but I want to make this mistake so I could learn it my self, as unless I experience it my 18 years old brain dont believes it.
Thanks for all of your support and sorry if it looks like I ignored your advice but I will promise not to go the usual root ( community) and try as hard as I can to get jobs in other sectors ( industry, GP/ Hospital).