Is everyone worried for no reason?

[MountainPharmD]

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I have heard this repeated over and over again like it is some talisman that will ward off the dangers looming in the future. However, it just does not fit with retail business. There WILL be more prescriptions. The chains will have the SAME or FEWER pharmacists fill the greater volume. In the face of declining reimbursement from PBMs and a need to return consistently increasing shareholder value they really have no other choice. Pharmacists will have no choice but to comply...or the corporate overlords can just get an eager new grad with 200K in loans to come in and do it. Will it be dangerous for the customer? Hell yes. Will problems happen? Of course. Will pharmacists keep on working faster and faster, pushing more and more volume? Absolutely..

I am with you my friend. I laugh every time I hear how the baby boomers are going to save us with all thier Medicare part D prescriptions or whatever horrible plan the government decides to replace it with. Anyone who has been practice and paying attention since Medicare part D went into effect knows the damage it has done to the profession. Your assesment is spot on in my opinion based on what I have seen. More Medicare prescriptions means the current Pharmacists or even less will be filling more and more because of the ****ty reimbursemnt from the government. Oh and to top it off the governemnt contiunes to cut the reimbusement.

I do think eventually (7-10 years) things will improve again. Between now and then are some very tough years ahead.

I think you are being overly optimistic. I hope you are right. I hate to think the rest of my carrier is going to be like this and most likely worse.

 

[rxlea]

I worked at Osco when we switched to Medicare Part D. It was an effing nightmare. I have lost all faith in our government when it comes to health care (and not just because of that).

The boomers have sucked us dry and do you think they are really going to retire anytime soon? Must be nice to be a boomer... smoked their 20's away and didn't need a degree to get into their jobs. Relatively no debt for school, plenty of investments (although a lot of them lost a lot in 2007-2008), and now they are reaping the benefits of pensions which are going to get cut for our generation. They will suck us dry of every last drop of social security, which I read on an internet news source would be dry by the 2020's.

 

[Its Z]

I think you are being overly optimistic. I hope you are right. I hate to think the rest of my carrier is going to be like this and most likely worse.

I see UPS is in the future for you.

 

[rxlea]

I see UPS is in the future for you.

Or this... ?

 

[Its Z]

Nah..more like this.

 

[rxlea]

Or this..

 

[cjhrph]

I am with you my friend. I laugh every time I hear how the baby boomers are going to save us with all thier Medicare part D prescriptions or whatever horrible plan the government decides to replace it with. Anyone who has been practice and paying attention since Medicare part D went into effect knows the damage it has done to the profession. Your assesment is spot on in my opinion based on what I have seen. More Medicare prescriptions means the current Pharmacists or even less will be filling more and more because of the ****ty reimbursemnt from the government.

Baby boomers..makes me laugh. This is so true. 6 years ago in our closed door shop we'd fill 1200/day with 4 pharmacists, now in 2011, we're filling 4000/day with just 5. We do it with more techs, better software, bar code scanning, pre-packaging, and automation. Those who are convincing themselves that increased prescription volume and pharmacist employment are related in any sort of linear fashion are fooling themselves.

 

[rrr10]

Pharmacy schools are money makers. Also, it is against the law to try to limit the # of pharm schools in the US (anti-trust law) unfortunately.

 

[Zoupa]

do you think the saturation will spill over into canada (toronto, vancouver, etc.)? from my understanding, it's pretty easy for USA pharmds to practice up here.

 

[medapplicant88]

In terms of the economy, what kind of sucks is that in previous recessions we have been able to spend out of a recession. Unfortunately with the debt being so high, we're unable to really do that anymore.

This recovery might take a long long time. People earning professional degrees need to have a global approach to finding a job. Maybe Canada.

 

[pfaction]

There's no point anymore.

In NYS, like stated, there were 1200 graduates this year alone. No one will hire them for 100k. I look grimly forward to when I get to graduate. But we've dug ourselves into a hole.

Imagine if the people that wanted 4 year BSPharm back got their way. LMAO, retail pharmacy saturation is an understatement.

 

[PumpkinSmasher]

In terms of the economy, what kind of sucks is that in previous recessions we have been able to spend out of a recession. Unfortunately with the debt being so high, we're unable to really do that anymore.

This recovery might take a long long time. People earning professional degrees need to have a global approach to finding a job. Maybe Canada.

I have a feeling the Indian Health Service will not have trouble staffing ultra rural areas in the coming years...