Any career changers out there?

[ranum]

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Hey everyone!

I'm not sure if there's a previous thread on this subject but...

Any current PharmD's or students out there that came from a completely different background? That is, anyone who worked for a bit in a different field then switched over to pharmacy?

I'd love to hear your story up to where you are now! What made you do it? How did you cope with going back to school and taking prerequisites? What would you have done differently?

Thanks!

 

[BelleMD2B]

Me!

I'm coming from a finance background (previous trader and now research at a hedge fund - no, not ALL of finance is doing poorly, btw). Leaving a fantastic salary to pursue the field - clearly not in it for the money as I'll be making a lot less than I do now. I'll be an older applicant (34 next summer when I take my PCAT and put in apps).

I've always had interest in the medical field, in general. I turned down a liberal medical education program (8 year continuum, no MCAT) coming out of high school because I didn't want to be shepherded into something without knowing everything I could about what I was getting into. Looking back, best decision I ever made. No desire to be a doctor - playing the guessing came, solving the puzzles of diseases, etc. BUT, I would like to contribute to the field. And for me, pharmacy is the way to do that. Taking out some of the subjective, and being the objective source of knowledge about drug interaction is what appeals to me.

So, I'm on the road to pharmacy, via declining medicine, and finding myself through the world of finance.

I'm sure it will appeal to some AdComs, while other's will think I'm flighty...the right fit is what I have to find out!

 

[FarscapeGirl]

So I'm starting pharmacy school this fall after just finishing a PhD in Molecular and Cellular Biology. I had gone straight into grad school after undergrad, thinking I wanted to do research because I enjoyed biology so much. I figured out pretty quickly that after I was done with grad school I would no longer want to do research. It wasn't until after my fourth year when one of our student helpers was entering pharmacy school that I realized pharmacy was for me. I like the idea of having a professional career. I like working with people (even if a select few of them annoy the heck out of me). And I like learning about drugs, their interactions, their side effects, etc.

I don't mind school too much (although I can't wait to have a real job!), and while it will be tight money-wise for my husband and me for awhile, the debt we go into will be worth it.

 

[Ritalin]

Hey everyone!

I'm not sure if there's a previous thread on this subject but...

Any current PharmD's or students out there that came from a completely different background? That is, anyone who worked for a bit in a different field then switched over to pharmacy?

I'd love to hear your story up to where you are now! What made you do it? How did you cope with going back to school and taking prerequisites? What would you have done differently?

Thanks!

I'll bite on this one... I became a police officer at 19 in my state because I had graduated HS at 17 and there was a loop hole that if you had 45 college credits at 19, you go to the academy. I did that part time while I was still in college, I decided that law enforcement might not be the path for me and double majored in social work. I had an internship at the Department of Human Services as a child protection caseworker investigating child abuse... The state paid for my masters degree in social work and I choose the clinical path. I became a therapist on a child psychiatric lock down unit... There was a pharm student on rotation there and I started talking to her about pharm school. I had thought about it in HS but didnt want to move away then. The more I talked to her, the more I realized that pharmacy is what I had always wanted to do to begin with and I liked knowing on how drugs worked... I wanted to know how a psychotic patient was suddenly lucid after getting a dose of haldol...

Ironically my sign on name here, Ritalin, is in respect to my cat, who I had named a good 5 years before even considering pharmacy school. I always say naming him was foreshadowing my future, haha..

so anyway, I think I have one of the more ecclectic paths to pharmacy.. certainly NOT the norm