If not pharmacy what else should I do and why?

[GOINGBALD42]

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Been shadowing and talking to various pharmacists and techs. Lots of negativity on the forum, 50/50 pharmacists dissuading me, and techs too. The ones who have given positive feedback tend to be older in their 50s. Doesn't deal with the saturation and is already established. got big bonuses for working. I don't know what to do haha. What other careers should I consider and why? Or should I stick with pharm?

 

[beautifulrobot]

From what I can tell from your message history you are a few years out of college and have shadowed a variety of health professions already. Why are you focused on healthcare in the first place, and clinical settings specifically? Why not health IT, medical research, policy, administration, environmental health, or compliance? Or why even healthcare? Why not go into IT, finance, business, politics, engineering, law enforcement, or some type of trade?

I take it you're not in school at the moment, but maybe your local government offers career counseling services. Or it might be worth it to cough up the money to meet with a professional career counselor. It wouldn't hurt to do a quick web search and find out what resources are out there. If you are really open to anything and you have no disqualifying medical conditions, you could do Peace Corps or join the military. If you can afford it, travel around the country and meet as many different people as you can. Browse through the BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook until you find something that sounds interesting and try to find someone to shadow to learn more about the job.

 

[gwarm01]

I don't know anything about you, so I'm going to say...... Line cook.

 

[steveysmith54]

I think it depends on your credentials, such as GPA, location (determines level of saturation), likes and dislikes, etc. MD/DO route is obviosly would be my number one choice... PA/NP, occupational therapy, speech therapy are interesting options

 

[Charcoales]

Computer science focus on software engineering

 

[CetiAlphaFive]

Been shadowing and talking to various pharmacists and techs. Lots of negativity on the forum, 50/50 pharmacists dissuading me, and techs too. The ones who have given positive feedback tend to be older in their 50s. Doesn't deal with the saturation and is already established. got big bonuses for working. I don't know what to do haha. What other careers should I consider and why? Or should I stick with pharm?

I wish I'd gone to law school

 

[lord999]

If you have enough math skill that you could have done IT, consider becoming an actuary instead. The career is a chill, office environment place. No one screaming in your face. Everyone makes it a point to be civil (if not more commonly polite), does not have the job fluctuations of IT, have excellent career prospects, and minimum is $110k in most areas with intellectually satisfying work. There aren't the hard deadlines that IT faces and it's well-known to not have as serious an H1B competition problem for a technical job. Both of the usual professional societies (CAS and SOA) actually are decent groups unlike pharmacy organizations and have well-meaning and useful reasons to having membership association besides credentialing and the AAA is a much better oversight on quality standards within the practice than NABP over pharmacy.

Had I done this all over again, I would have become an actuary first before pharmacy school, but probably never would have gone to pharmacy as senior actuaries at the civil service are compensated far better than pharmacists in both salary and work circumstances.

 

[gwarm01]

I wish I'd gone to law school

That's funny. I'm working with an Epic consultant right now who went to law school and says they never would have gone if they knew about this whole healthcare IT thing.

 

[Dalteparin]

I wish I'd gone to law school

Not with today's market saturation! Lawyers have it as bad as we do, if not worse.

 

[Jbrl]

He was joking 😛

 

[Lnsean]

Doesn't have to be healthcare man. Some of my friends did comp sci with a focus on infosec and are killing it. One guy went from 65k a year to like 200k/ayear (span of 5 years) now working on cyber security and has clearance with the government (he gets multiple offers and calls for jobs like every other week). All the pharmacy people I know...started at 90-120k and have been stuck around there. Some people work OT and stuff...but that's not really moving up...you're just trading more time for more money.

 

[Abby Atwood]

Your career is a personal decision, but I love pharmacy. If your are interested in pharmacy I wouldn't discourage you. I am glad that I am a pharmacist. I will include a caveat that you should think about your expectations for practicing pharmacy. It is likely that your first job will be retail or in a small town or both. It can be slow work moving to any other type of position. On the other hand, I couldn't be happier with where I'm at. I'm less than a year out of school and I'm in my mid 20s. 🙂

Research other careers carefully. People in other fields may have similar complaints to what you are seeing in pharmacy.

 

[CetiAlphaFive]

My post was tongue in cheek, but there are other ways to make money with a JD if your innovative

 

[Rouelle]

I think accounting might have been fun.

 

[vm26]

Been shadowing and talking to various pharmacists and techs. Lots of negativity on the forum, 50/50 pharmacists dissuading me, and techs too. The ones who have given positive feedback tend to be older in their 50s. Doesn't deal with the saturation and is already established. got big bonuses for working. I don't know what to do haha. What other careers should I consider and why? Or should I stick with pharm?

I can't comment on the pharm market/longterm outlook but if you are committed to healthcare I would consider PA or RN-->NP/CRNA

 

[CYP-0]

Why not health IT, medical research, policy, administration, environmental health, or compliance? Or why even healthcare? Why not go into IT, finance, business, politics, engineering, law enforcement, or some type of trade?

Your career is a personal decision, but I love pharmacy. If your are interested in pharmacy I wouldn't discourage you. I am glad that I am a pharmacist. I will include a caveat that you should think about your expectations for practicing pharmacy. It is likely that your first job will be retail or in a small town or both. It can be slow work moving to any other type of position. On the other hand, I couldn't be happier with where I'm at. I'm less than a year out of school and I'm in my mid 20s. 🙂

Research other careers carefully. People in other fields may have similar complaints to what you are seeing in pharmacy.

I agree.

OP, the decision is ultimately yours. But know as much facts as possible before making it. I'm sure you also know that the saturation issue is geographically moderated.

Moreover, if you are among the select few that choose to specialize in something like oncology, post PGY2, you are not going to struggle much finding a job...if you even struggle at all.

 

[DrVader]

Been shadowing and talking to various pharmacists and techs. Lots of negativity on the forum, 50/50 pharmacists dissuading me, and techs too. The ones who have given positive feedback tend to be older in their 50s. Doesn't deal with the saturation and is already established. got big bonuses for working. I don't know what to do haha. What other careers should I consider and why? Or should I stick with pharm?

I'm getting out of healthcare and going into business. One thing you must keep in mind when talking to people is cognitive dissonance. I work with pharmacist who hate their jobs but they are too established to quit. The old pharmacists had the best of both worlds. They went to school when it was cheap and all you needed was a bachelor's to practice. Now they make ass load of money. It is was a great return on investment. But keep this in mind, no matter how bad it is now. It will be 10x worst by the time you graduate. Pharmacy schools will always find idiots who are willing to take out loans for that promised six figure job. And as long as the feds are willing to loan money to anyone with a pulse they will get it.