how much harder is pharmacy school?

[njac]

I am/was pretty underwhelmed by pharmacy school. I had expected it to be the stereotypical "med school" hard - in the library all the time, etc.

I did not find that to be the case.

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[AngelaCL]

Organic Chem, Physics, and Calculus were all harder than any subject I learned in pharmacy school. I do not believe there are any difficult concepts that you need to sit and think about and do practice problems to understand them in pharmacy school however there is a lot more material to memorize in a shorter amount of time.

Whereas I would say that physics and calculus were ridiculously easy compared to biochemistry, med chem, or some other pharmacy classes. It depends on your circumstances, your school, etc. And happily, so far I've not had a semester where every single class is difficult - that would make me want to pull out my hair. Last semester I had a couple classes where I got an A without too much trouble at all (prepharmacy level of difficulty or easier), one class where I got an A with a pretty good amount of work, and two classes where I didn't get an A no matter how hard I worked. That's not something I had really faced in prepharmacy - in undergrad I generally didn't put in maximum effort, except for organic chem.

 

[loo]

Stress Analogy:

Pre-pharm= kick in the shins

Pharmacy (professional years)= kick in the a**

Vet school= kick in the groin with steel-toed boots


Workload Analogy:

Pre-pharm= drinking from a low pressure garden hose

Pharmacy= drinking from a pressure hose

Vet school= drinking from a geyser or Niagara Falls


Social Analogy:

Pre-pharm= free-for-all partying

Pharmacy= targeted binge drinking

Vet school= prisoner with rare conjugal visits

 

[meister]

Conjugal visits? Vet school sounds pretty sweet to me!

 

[loo]

RARE conjugal visits. That's not sweet, IMHO.

And with humans...in case your little sick mind was wondering.

 

[meister]

Well there's your problem, you have to expand it to include our non-homo sapien mamallian brethren.

 

[dangerdog]

How difficult/stressful is pharmacy school compared to undergrad? Are the stuff you learn in pharmacy school comparable to the Bios and Chems/ochems, physics, calculus learned as an undergrad?

Rate fthe level of difficulty from 1 to 10 for your experience as undergrad
and
1 to 10 for pharmacy school, 1 being easy.

Sorry but I don't know what I'm getting myself into and I just want to prepare myself by getting feedback from you guys, who are now in pharmacy school!

Thanks so much@

Undergrad = 1. UT-Austin, skipped class 1/3 of the time, just cramed the night before and graduated with 3.75 GPA. That's how easy B.S molecular bio was.

OSU Pharmacy school: p1 = 3. Still partied every weekend, studied 3 nights a week, 3-4 hours a night. 3.7 GPA

P2 = 8. Wham, it hits you. Forget partying, forget fun; 4 hours per day, 7 days a week + 12 hr/wk work. It was an endless cycle of cram for a test -> take test -> cram for next test. Did manage a 3.9 GPA.

p3 = 6. Finally backed off. 3-4 hours studying a night, 5 days a week. Can worth both days each weekend without feeling burnt out. But can't slack off for more than a day pilling up. 4.0 GPA so far.

Of course, if shooting for a B average, you can cut studying time in half, and shave off 2 points off the stress level.

I know, I know, GPA doesn't matter, but I just hate to lose to my peers. Besides, scholarship money is riding on it -- it's the difference between graduating with $100K in debt or $80K in debt. Of course, it matters a bit for residency as well.

 

[LandSpeeder]

would anyone like to comment on how hard auburn's hsop is compared to auburn undergrad?

Did you ever receive any feedback about this? Thinking of going back to school to try to apply to HSOP and don't really know if I'm capable...

 

[timbutt2]

I would say Pharmacy School is 2-3X more difficult.

It's much more of a time commitment.

 

[meteor2]

Undergrad = 1. UT-Austin, skipped class 1/3 of the time, just cramed the night before and graduated with 3.75 GPA. That's how easy B.S molecular bio was.

OSU Pharmacy school: p1 = 3. Still partied every weekend, studied 3 nights a week, 3-4 hours a night. 3.7 GPA

P2 = 8. Wham, it hits you. Forget partying, forget fun; 4 hours per day, 7 days a week + 12 hr/wk work. It was an endless cycle of cram for a test -> take test -> cram for next test. Did manage a 3.9 GPA.

p3 = 6. Finally backed off. 3-4 hours studying a night, 5 days a week. Can worth both days each weekend without feeling burnt out. But can't slack off for more than a day pilling up. 4.0 GPA so far.

Of course, if shooting for a B average, you can cut studying time in half, and shave off 2 points off the stress level.

I know, I know, GPA doesn't matter, but I just hate to lose to my peers. Besides, scholarship money is riding on it -- it's the difference between graduating with $100K in debt or $80K in debt. Of course, it matters a bit for residency as well.

What school do you go to?

 

[Julianne]

Did you ever receive any feedback about this? Thinking of going back to school to try to apply to HSOP and don't really know if I'm capable...

If either of you are still interested in hearing opinion(s), I'll be glad to share mine with you. Just finished my P2 year today (Woohoo!!)...

Feel free to respond here or via PM.

 

[eightball]

chalk one up for spring of P2 year.

With a gun to my head, I wont/will not do it over

 

[acetyl]

chalk one up for spring of P2 year.

With a gun to my head, I wont/will not do it over

I second that. PY2 really sucked in general but the second semester just wore me out. Too much...information.

 

[RobertRodrig1]

I realize that the difficulty of pharmacy school is relative to the person and her/his previous education. I saw in a previous post that one person mentioned that biology undergrads had a tough time with certain subjects while chemistry major had a hard time with others. In my opinion there is a huge difference between biology and chemistry undergrads. For example, most chemistry majors "think" everything out and need a reason for everything to happen while most biology majors "memorize" and regurgitate information. Please give me your thoughts on this and how it pertains to the difficulty of graduate school.

 

[charfdorn]

I realize that the difficulty of pharmacy school is relative to the person and her/his previous education. I saw in a previous post that one person mentioned that biology undergrads had a tough time with certain subjects while chemistry major had a hard time with others. In my opinion there is a huge difference between biology and chemistry undergrads. For example, most chemistry majors "think" everything out and need a reason for everything to happen while most biology majors "memorize" and regurgitate information. Please give me your thoughts on this and how it pertains to the difficulty of graduate school.

I guess I'm screwed then... with my English/Creative Writing degree.

 

[fhx06]

I guess I'm screwed then... with my English/Creative Writing degree.

At least you can be articulate and a great orator.

 

[RobertRodrig1]

English majors don't have labs. I would see that as one of the big differences. As a chemistry major I used to spend endless hours doing research. You had to have taken the pre-reqs (chem and bio classes) though even if you are an english major.

 

[tungsten87]

Last 2 years of molecular and micro undergrad: 6
1st semester of pharm school: 8

The first couple weeks were pretty easy and laid back. I guess they didn't want to throw us into full gear right away. So far the worst week was the middle of the semester at week 8. We don't have any cumulative finals this semester so our last week shouldn't be too bad.

I've never had anything more than 13 credit hours so it was a shock to have this much to do all the time ... whether it's an exam, speech, quiz, or misc. assignment. And while all of that is happening, I have about 4-5 lectures a day to watch. The material isn't difficult, it's the amount of material and the testing methods from professors that can sometimes get frustrating.

i'm sure your undergrad difficulty would drop a point or two without dr. white's microbio class.

 

[Pianopooh]

Undergrad (year 1,2): 5
PY1 (year 3): 8
PY2 (year 4): 9

Pharmacotherapy is tough at my school, especially taking it with pharmacokinetics.

 

[samanta7]

More material and tests, Organic Chem, Physics, and Calculus were all harder than any subject I learned in pharmacy school

 

[Noelle Paris]

Pharmacy school is hard to get into and hard to get through. There is such a huge workload. There are so many tests, assignments and labs.

 

[J ROD]

Few extra classes are about it. More BS to do, but not hard.....it was much easier than I expected.

 

[Chuck61686]

Having graduated nursing school (BSN) and currently in an accelerated PharmD program, I find the latter to be far less stressful and much more structured. To make an analogy of the stress effect:
Nursing school: Trying to escape a swamp surrounded by a swarm of copperhead snakes (difficult, and not straight forward).
Pharmacy school: Climbing the Rocky Mountains (difficult, but structured.)

Also, the grading curves are different:
Nursing School-
<76.5 - fail
76.5 - 84.49, C
84.5 - 92.49, B
92.5 - 100, A

Pharmacy School-
<69.5 - fail
70-79 C
80-89 B
90-100 A

* In pharmacy school, the course material is based on empirically validated, research-based information. If you study hard and get the concept, you'll do fantastic.
* In nursing school, it's all theory based - studying doesn't pay off half as much as it should. (Ie. I always got Bs in nursing theory I, II, III and IV.) I did, however, get an A in pharmacology. I also got As in almost all of my science pre-reqs for pharm school.

 

[woot544]

Undergrad: 8
Rx school (so far): 5

Undergrad tends to work at weeding students out. At my pharm. school they want you to do well and won't let you fall behind. Lab's are MUCH more laid back than they ever were in undergrad!

Just wondering... what Pharm school did you attend??

 

[eightball]

just finished the didactic part of pharmacy school today...80% of what I did and learned in the past three years is pure bull. With a gun to my head, i would not do it again.

Academia has a lot of daydreaming, overpaid, utopian idealists disguised as professors. This is one the happiest days of mi life ))

 

[Pinser555]

i'm sure your undergrad difficulty would drop a point or two without dr. white's microbio class.

UCF I assume. Glad to finally find another knight on here...

 

[Falokis]

Did you ever receive any feedback about this? Thinking of going back to school to try to apply to HSOP and don't really know if I'm capable...

Undergrad at AU was a 3 with minimal effort and studying. (when I actually tried or went to class)

HSOP at first I thought it was a 10, but it's not as bad as that. It depends on your study habits. For me it was hard because undergrad was so easy, I wasn't used to actually having to study more than the night before for a test. I was a person who could do that. If you have bad study habits or are unwilling to put the time in, it will be a 10. You cannot study just the night before and get even a passing grade. It will be as hard as you make it. If you put the time in, it will be a 6-7. Putting in the time means studying a minimum of 3 hours a day outside of classes.

P1 is hard because of the adjustment to faster pace, harder material, more difficult testing, and having to learn better time management. The 2nd semester you start to get used to it and it's not as bad.
P2 is brutal mostly because the pace picks up about 2x the first year.
P3 isn't bad at all because you are doing classes where you are applying knowledge instead of jamming it all in your head.
P4 is a cake walk


edit - damn it. I didn't notice that was from a year ago.

 

[StringTheorist]

Undergrad: 5 (until I started to really worry about my pre-req classes, then a 9)
Pharm School:
1st yr: 6
2nd Yr: 10
3rd Yr: 4

 

[PharmacistReb]

Pre-pharmacy was way more stress-filled and difficult. Way more math based course work and nonsense.

I'll take memorization and longer hours over the stress of actually getting into pharmacy school along with calculus, physics, organic....

 

[Krismeese09]

I may be a little different than the typical posts preceding, but I found undergrad far more challenging. I did Engineering though and it was, obviously, extremely mathematics intensive. I have never felt more dumb than walking out of some of those engineering exams lol.

Pharmacy school was the more typical study and memorize approach. Most things make intuitive sense if you think of them from a physiological basis.

 

[psychoandy]

I might be biased because I just finished P3, which is only hard because professors throw so much information at you so quickly. I've never had advanced level classes where you have an exam every 2 weeks. Additionally, the professors admit that they don't have enough time to cover material in depth...not cute. I feel bad for med students because as a pharmacy student, I feel like I could use way more time actually learning/discussing therapeutics. And MDs not only have to diagnose but treat...it's ridiculous. Then again I guess that's why residency is several years...

P1 and P2 was harder in regards to material, IMO. Most people in P3 should generally have an idea of what drugs do what, whereas in P1 you get grilled on all sorts of arcane molecular structures and BS. For example, I had no issues with kinetics, but pcol was pretty terrible. Ancillary classes like stats and interpreting journal articles were fine, but others like immunology were ridiculous.

 

[inquirer89]

My last final tomorrow and will be an upcoming p2. The first year has been tough, harder than undergrad. Never had to study this hard- I could do maybe 3-6 hours the night before a test in undergrad, but in pharm school I'd start studying a few days before and easily 10+ hours the night before. I agree that each individual class is either easier or on par with Ochem or Physics, but taking 4 challenging classes plus electives, projects, learning Top 100, extracurriculars, etc. all add up. I felt like I was always catching up. The sucky thing is that this is supposedly the "easy" year, and p2 fall semester is the toughest out of the whole program. Craaaapp...definitely working on my study skills over this summer.

 

[QoQ]

Hey ndearwater
i was wondering the name of the pharmacy school you go to. Please let me know thanks!

Undergrad: 8
Rx school (so far): 5

Undergrad tends to work at weeding students out. At my pharm. school they want you to do well and won't let you fall behind. Lab's are MUCH more laid back than they ever were in undergrad!

 

[PharmacistReb]

Our third year is completely problem based learning. There are no more lectures or classes to attend. We meet in "group" and complete treatment plans and have two tests per block.. 4 blocks in one year. At Ole Miss, P3 year is far and way the most rigorous. Essentially, it's the therapeutics portion of our curriculum all rolled up into a full year.

 

[RxMTM]

I would say it depends on what kind of learner you are. If you are a memorizer, then pharmacy school will be easier. If you are a deep thinker, then pre-pharmacy will be easier. As a thinker, my brain has pretty much atrophied during the first year of pharmacy school. It is all memorization with minimal thinking.

 

[maria1oh]

I think pharmacy school is harder than undergraduate for a few reasons.

1. The financial burden is insane. You have to pay professional tuition, which is more than double or triple at some schools compared to undergraduate. I have more debt from one year in pharmacy school than I did in all 4 years combined of undergraduate.

2. You have flexible scheduling as an undergraduate and I rarely had to take classes before 9 am since so many different organic chemistry classes were offered per quarter. In pharmacy school it is more structured and everyone is taking the same exact class and it always start at 8 am. I went to a public university for undergraduate and I had the option of like 5 different organic chemistry classes per quarter each at different times. Now in pharmacy school a class only has one option per quarter.

3. No summer school option to take classes as a pharmacy student.

Good luck though, and remember if you were accepted by the admissions team then believe in yourself because they already have considered you capable of handling the coursework.

 

[RxMTM]

I think pharmacy school is harder than undergraduate for a few reasons.

1. The financial burden is insane. You have to pay professional tuition, which is more than double or triple at some schools compared to undergraduate. I have more debt from one year in pharmacy school than I did in all 4 years combined of undergraduate.

2. You have flexible scheduling as an undergraduate and I rarely had to take classes before 9 am since so many different organic chemistry classes were offered per quarter. In pharmacy school it is more structured and everyone is taking the same exact class and it always start at 8 am. I went to a public university for undergraduate and I had the option of like 5 different organic chemistry classes per quarter each at different times. Now in pharmacy school a class only has one option per quarter.

3. No summer school option to take classes as a pharmacy student.

Good luck though, and remember if you were accepted by the admissions team then believe in yourself because they already have considered you capable of handling the coursework.

Nice alternate perspective. The rigid scheduling is definitely a minus. Undergrad is so much more flexible. >100K debt is also such a difference.

 

[type b pharmD]

Nice alternate perspective. The rigid scheduling is definitely a minus. Undergrad is so much more flexible. >100K debt is also such a difference.

i would argue the opposite.

at our school, attendance is not required. I dont think i attended a single non lab class this semester

 

[RxMTM]

i would argue the opposite.

at our school, attendance is not required. I dont think i attended a single non lab class this semester

I'm envying you right now...most of my classes are required to count attendance as 5% of the total grade. Most of the material can be read at home and it is quite hard to sit through so many lectures where they read to you.

 

[ucrx]

I would say it depends on what kind of learner you are. If you are a memorizer, then pharmacy school will be easier. If you are a deep thinker, then pre-pharmacy will be easier. As a thinker, my brain has pretty much atrophied during the first year of pharmacy school. It is all memorization with minimal thinking.

I feel like it was the opposite for me. Pre-pharmacy was more memorization than pharmacy classes. I tend to look at the big picture and how things interact with each other. If I understand how something works or the reasoning behind it, I can remember it. Therapeutics classes and rotations would have been impossible or at least much harder without actually understanding things.

 

[Kalium]

I feel like it was the opposite for me. Pre-pharmacy was more memorization than pharmacy classes. I tend to look at the big picture and how things interact with each other. If I understand how something works or the reasoning behind it, I can remember it. Therapeutics classes and rotations would have been impossible or at least much harder without actually understanding things.

I hope you're right. I'm definitely more of a thinker than a memorizer, although throughout undergrad I developed the ability to memorize when I had to. Still, if I know the theory behind something, I find it so much easier to retain and apply that information in different contexts.

 

[ucrx]

I hope you're right. I'm definitely more of a thinker than a memorizer, although throughout undergrad I developed the ability to memorize when I had to. Still, if I know the theory behind something, I find it so much easier to retain and apply that information in different contexts.

Even if there is something I have to memorize, I find it much easier if I understand it in some way. There were classes early on in pharmacy school that had less thinking/more memorization, but I feel like as things became more clinical it shifted.

 

[RxMTM]

It's good to get different viewpoints. I kinda only saw from my perspective. What do you guys think about having required attendance at pharmacy school? Most of the professors read from slides so it's hard for me to get interested. I know that some people learn from attending class though. What are you guys thoughts?

 

[Ramzy]

P1 - 8 (although aced nearly every exam)
P2 - 9.5 (im sure this is biased though, because i work 2 days a week in addition)
P3 - im sure it will be easier than P2 since it's rotations

Would I do it again? Honestly, no... im nearly done P2 now... i don't know how i didnt commit suicide already... the first words coming out of my mouth every morning (that's if i get to sleep) is "****"... i was already burnt out 1 month into P2: physically and mentally... It's not about difficulty... it's straight up too much material in such little time... i guess if i didn't work, it would be easier.

i think i'm a little biased since i had no prior pharmacy experience going into pharmacy school and no degree (bare minimum pre-reqs)... i go to university of southern nevada... they changed their name by the way into Roseman University lol

 

[PharmStud12]

What school did you go to for pharmacy?

 

[PharmStud12]

Undergrad: 8
Rx school (so far): 5

Undergrad tends to work at weeding students out. At my pharm. school they want you to do well and won't let you fall behind. Lab's are MUCH more laid back than they ever were in undergrad!

What pharmacy school did you go to?

 

[type b pharmD]

It's good to get different viewpoints. I kinda only saw from my perspective. What do you guys think about having required attendance at pharmacy school? Most of the professors read from slides so it's hard for me to get interested. I know that some people learn from attending class though. What are you guys thoughts?

would not have attended pharm school if attendance was required. Havent been to a single class since p1

 

[homeslice]

would not have attended pharm school if attendance was required. Havent been to a single class since p1

That's absurd, but I'm envious.

 

[CuriousPharmD]

first of all if your not in pharm school yet...dont go and look into goin into something else....there is just not jobs out there and you dont want to get stuck with 100k in student loan debt with no job!!!

to answer your question....

for me undergrad was definitely more stressful cuz i was gunning for straight As since getting into pharm school when i was applying was harder it seems like it is now since there were only 2 schools in my area at the time...less than 10% entrance rate...now i guess it would be easier to get in since there are like 6 schools in my area...wow!! GOIN BACK TO MY ORIGINAL STATEMENT...dont go to pharm school....there are MORE grads now for LESS jobs...

pharm school was way less stressful since you just to PASS the classes...like the old saying goes Cs gets you degrees....

 

[oliviaalta123]

How difficult/stressful is pharmacy school compared to undergrad? Are the stuff you learn in pharmacy school comparable to the Bios and Chems/ochems, physics, calculus learned as an undergrad?

Rate fthe level of difficulty from 1 to 10 for your experience as undergrad
and
1 to 10 for pharmacy school, 1 being easy.

Sorry but I don't know what I'm getting myself into and I just want to prepare myself by getting feedback from you guys, who are now in pharmacy school!

Thanks so much@

Undergrad I would rate it 8.
Pharmacy school a 6.