Employment Statistics on PharmD's with residency?

[AprilSmith]

Does anyone have specific stats on the employment rates for new pharmacists who have completed a residency?

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[superrx01]

I'm not sure about stats but I know a lot of people who have completed PGY-2's and are struggling to find clinical pharmacist positions, all they can find are staff pharmacist positions

 

[AprilSmith]

So in your experience, there's not too much trouble getting staff pharmacist positions with a PGY1? I am interested in being a staff pharmacist, not a clinical pharmacist. Can I ask what geographical area you're in?

 

[headortail]

So in your experience, there's not too much trouble getting staff pharmacist positions with a PGY1? I am interested in being a staff pharmacist, not a clinical pharmacist. Can I ask what geographical area you're in?

I find that many hospitals make pharmacists do both staffing and clinical work, which I find to be the best scenario. To answer your question, no, you can find a staffing pharmacist position (that involves A LOT of clinical work) with just a PGY-1. In fact, I did not consider doing a PGY-2 because I didn't want to specialize (in ID, peds, oncology, what have you). That does not mean that my job is not "clinical" - I do anticoag, DM, ASP, rounding with the team etc. at my hospital. This may be different as I work at community hospitals vs large academic center. I still can't imagine even large academic centers to require PGY-2 for gen med floors though...

PGY-2 is really for people who know what areas of practice they want to specialize in. Many PGY-2 end up not having a primary practice at a hospital but rather a hybrid teaching/clinical pharmacist type of work associated with a pharmacy school. I also had no interest in academia, hence no PGY-2 for me.

Whether your job is pure "staffing" (aka operational) or "clinical" purely depends on your hospital set up and not on whether you do a PGY-2 or not. There's no point for me to do a PGY-2 when all I want to do is gen med. Regardless, I firmly believe that your "staffing" is as clinical, or as lacking in clinical judgment, as you make it. You could be verifying both that cefepime and pip/tazo orders and leave the troubleshoot of duplicate abx for the "clinical" shift the next day, or you could be calling and asking whether the doc really meant to order both... (typical answer: Woops, pt is already on cefepime? My bad, please cancel my pip/tazo). If you work in the hospital, chances are you will be exerting a lot of clinical judgment regardless of the shifts you work, if you choose to do so. Even with the least "clinical" shift like checking (IV, cassette fills, etc), you can STILL be clinical. ("Wait, why is this patient on both Lovenox and Xarelto in the fill?") Some of the most brilliant, most "clinical" pharmacists I work with only do "staffing" shifts d/t the hours/schedule. They probably make more clinical interventions than I do on my "clinical" shifts sometimes.

 

[Dred Pirate]

So in your experience, there's not too much trouble getting staff pharmacist positions with a PGY1? I am interested in being a staff pharmacist, not a clinical pharmacist. Can I ask what geographical area you're in?

it varies drastically based on geography.
Some areas you can be director of pharmacy in a small hospital with no residency, others a PGY-2 will struggle to find a staffing job.

 

[AprilSmith]

I find that many hospitals make pharmacists do both staffing and clinical work, which I find to be the best scenario. To answer your question, no, you can find a staffing pharmacist position (that involves A LOT of clinical work) with just a PGY-1. In fact, I did not consider doing a PGY-2 because I didn't want to specialize (in ID, peds, oncology, what have you). That does not mean that my job is not "clinical" - I do anticoag, DM, ASP, rounding with the team etc. at my hospital. This may be different as I work at community hospitals vs large academic center. I still can't imagine even large academic centers to require PGY-2 for gen med floors though...

PGY-2 is really for people who know what areas of practice they want to specialize in. Many PGY-2 end up not having a primary practice at a hospital but rather a hybrid teaching/clinical pharmacist type of work associated with a pharmacy school. I also had no interest in academia, hence no PGY-2 for me.

Whether your job is pure "staffing" (aka operational) or "clinical" purely depends on your hospital set up and not on whether you do a PGY-2 or not. There's no point for me to do a PGY-2 when all I want to do is gen med. Regardless, I firmly believe that your "staffing" is as clinical, or as lacking in clinical judgment, as you make it. You could be verifying both that cefepime and pip/tazo orders and leave the troubleshoot of duplicate abx for the "clinical" shift the next day, or you could be calling and asking whether the doc really meant to order both... (typical answer: Woops, pt is already on cefepime? My bad, please cancel my pip/tazo). If you work in the hospital, chances are you will be exerting a lot of clinical judgment regardless of the shifts you work, if you choose to do so. Even with the least "clinical" shift like checking (IV, cassette fills, etc), you can STILL be clinical. ("Wait, why is this patient on both Lovenox and Xarelto in the fill?") Some of the most brilliant, most "clinical" pharmacists I work with only do "staffing" shifts d/t the hours/schedule. They probably make more clinical interventions than I do on my "clinical" shifts sometimes.

I appreciate the input, but I wasn't trying to say that staff pharmacists don't do clinical work. "I am interested in being a staff pharmacist, not a clinical pharmacist." this is the language that is used at my school and the hospitals in my area to describe the two main kinds of pharmacists at hospitals in a very general sense. It was the simplest way to convey the type of pharmacist I want to be. I was in no way saying one is better than the other.

@everyone else, I hear many people say this comment that it varies by location. Can you give specific examples of the conditions of the job market in various locations?

 

[TheOracle]

I went on an interview at a large, well-respected, teaching hospital located in the heart of a popular metropolitan area in the Southwest and one of the residents expressed that she was afraid that she would not be able to find a job because saturation had gotten so bad. I was surprised because I always thought residency=some sort of employment.

A classmate told me of about a hospital that had two residents. The program hired Resident#1 as a clinical pharmacist (peds), while Resident #2 found part-time (16-20 hours) work in the ED of a small community hospital; both were very hard-working and intelligent. Sometimes hospitals just don't need any additional pharmacists.

I figure having a residency is better than nothing, but luck and connections help exponentially.

 

[Dred Pirate]

I went on an interview at a large, well-respected, teaching hospital located in the heart of a popular metropolitan area in the Southwest and one of the residents expressed that she was afraid that she would not be able to find a job because saturation had gotten so bad. I was surprised because I always thought residency=some sort of employment.

A classmate told me of about a hospital that had two residents. The program hired Resident#1 as a clinical pharmacist (peds), while Resident #2 found part-time (16-20 hours) work in the ED of a small community hospital; both we're very hard-working and intelligent. Sometimes hospitals just don't need any additional pharmacists.

I figure having a residency is better than nothing, but luck and connections help exponentially.

don't ever do a residency at a location simply because you think it will help you get a job at said hospital. If you ever let this on in the interview - you will instantly drop several places - you do a residency because you value the experience it helps you get -

 

[TheOracle]

don't ever do a residency at a location simply because you think it will help you get a job at said hospital. If you ever let this on in the interview - you will instantly drop several places - you do a residency because you value the experience it helps you get -

On interviews I usually ask what are the past residents doing now? -OR- What would you like to do once you're done with residency? I never bring up retention of residents or money.

 

[Dred Pirate]

On interviews I usually ask what are the past residents doing now? -OR- What would you like to do once you're done with residency? I never bring up retention of residents or money.

exactly - if you bring up money on a residency - you just look bad - even if you don't want to do a PGY-2 - lie and say you do - if makes you look more determined.