Been a pharmacy tech in both retail and hospital for many years. Retail with a drive through can be soul sucking work. It's 96% verification(meaning that the script matches the computer that matches the pills) that any idiot can do off the street, in which your only qualifications are: can you read? does the picture of this pill on the computer screen look like the pills in the bottle? If yes to both answers then the Rx is good and you send it off. The other 4%(being generous) work consists of answering phones and mostly very base questions that most seasoned techs can answer. You use your education about 1-2% of the time while the techs do most of your job. Great pay, great as a side job for extra work. If you go retail, go someplace without a drive through.
Hospital setting is where it's at. Most pharmacists do verification of tech work and doctors orders, it's mostly simple, but your knowledge base and experience expand significantly and it's nice to watch them call up the doctors and tell them where they're wrong and what to change. That's what they were educated for. Good hours, less stress, wonderful people, not so great pay but many have side hours in retail. Clinical Pharmacists are probably the best jobs around in the pharmacy world. They're right up on the floors educating and challenging the doctors and nurse practitioners. They participate in codes, treatment, almost the whole process. Not the best pay but better than verification, probably not as good as retail in terms of salary. But the hours are normal, not 12 hour shifts like almost all pharmacy positions.
Pharmacy can be a great career, but dentistry is for me.
