Pharmacists Schedule?

[WoodenCrawdad]

I would love to hear anyone's knowledge on the versatility of their schedule (or pharmacists they know). I worked in the home health care side of pharmacy where you'd normally pull a pretty average 5 day per week, 45-50 hour work week, on call occasionally. I'm curious though if there are commonly set-ups of 3, 12 hour days or 4, 10 hour days out there. Are these jobs available?

Thank you all for the help!

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[rxlynn]

I would love to hear anyone's knowledge on the versatility of their schedule (or pharmacists they know). I worked in the home health care side of pharmacy where you'd normally pull a pretty average 5 day per week, 45-50 hour work week, on call occasionally. I'm curious though if there are commonly set-ups of 3, 12 hour days or 4, 10 hour days out there. Are these jobs available?

Thank you all for the help!

Hi - I work for CVS, and a common schedule for some of the pharmacists in our district is the following:
One week is M, W, F, Sa 8am-10pm (the Sat. is 8-6)
Next week is S, Tu, TH (Su is 10-6) - so basically, you have one heavy week with your weekend, and then the other week it's just 2 days. One of the pharmacists at my store cut her hours after having a baby, so I think her base is like 30 or 32 a week. She works the following: 8am-5pm M, W, and F when she has her on weekend (same Sa S hours as above) - her short week is 8am-5pm M, W only. They pad our night shifts 5-10 pm with floaters, and the other full-time pharmacist works T, TH, and then F, Sa, S when he is on weekend. Atlanta is a busy market - not all markets for CVS have open hours this long.

 

[sdn1977]

There are any number of variable hours....OR is usually 10hrs, 4 days a week. Inpt - is usually 40hrs, variable shifts, every other weekend... That said.....every pharmacist is usually every other weekend unless you do home care/consulting, academics, etc...

I've worked 40hrs/wk & as low as 24 hrs/wk - totally variable & dependent upon what the marketplace is in your area at the time.

You may not want the same thing now that you want 10 or 15 years from now....so variable is good.

 

[baggywrinkle]

You may not want the same thing now that you want 10 or 15 years from now....so variable is good.

Yup, variable is good. My favorite schedule was four tens Friday through
Monday. Seven on and seven off was also very nice - like a small vacation.

This 9-5 M-F totally blows. I can't get anything done and cannot comprehend
how people tolerate this schedule. In fact, I dislike it so much I think I'll retire.

HEY ANNA BANNANA! You can have my job if you want it. I'm moving to
Missouri and will either go to work at Ft Leonard Wood or live that fast and dangerous life floating around the country for RPH on the go....

 

[museabuse]

Hi - I work for CVS, and a common schedule for some of the pharmacists in our district is the following:
One week is M, W, F, Sa 8am-10pm (the Sat. is 8-6)
Next week is S, Tu, TH (Su is 10-6) - so basically, you have one heavy week with your weekend, and then the other week it's just 2 days. One of the pharmacists at my store cut her hours after having a baby, so I think her base is like 30 or 32 a week. She works the following: 8am-5pm M, W, and F when she has her on weekend (same Sa S hours as above) - her short week is 8am-5pm M, W only. They pad our night shifts 5-10 pm with floaters, and the other full-time pharmacist works T, TH, and then F, Sa, S when he is on weekend. Atlanta is a busy market - not all markets for CVS have open hours this long.

I can't decide if I like that schedule? It averages to 44 hours a week. Do you get 4 hours of overtime per week? If not I think I would just do 7 on and 7 off and get it over with and have a week off every other week. Whats the point in having tue and thursday off during your busy week its not like you can do anything special since you worked till 10pm and have to work at 8am the next day. So basically you are living for a three day weekend every other week... seems crappy to me.

 

[museabuse]

What about this schedule. Split mondays... Busy week work later half of monday and all day tue,wed,fri,sat,sun easy week work monday morning and thursday. That way you have afternoon monday off and tues and wed(ie like a long weekend) then friday, saturday, and sunday (3 day weekend and not work monday till later). This seems better than the CVS schedule and you don't get burnt out on monday-the busiest day. Its the same # of hours as CVS but seems better to me. Also on slow week take a vaction day on thursday and you get a whole week off for the price of one vacation day.

I personally would like to find a slow store(where i can sit and rest for a while, ie grocery store/target) and work 7 on and 7 off. Then can work part time somewhere else or float overtime on my week off.

 

[rxlynn]

I can't decide if I like that schedule? It averages to 44 hours a week. Do you get 4 hours of overtime per week? If not I think I would just do 7 on and 7 off and get it over with and have a week off every other week. Whats the point in having tue and thursday off during your busy week its not like you can do anything special since you worked till 10pm and have to work at 8am the next day. So basically you are living for a three day weekend every other week... seems crappy to me.

No, I do not think that their full-time pharmacists get the overtime for over 40 - they get the overtime for anything over their established base, which I think in this market is normally 42 hours per week, but it varies from pharmacist to pharmacist depending on what they have negotiated. And, yes - I agree with you - I think it's a crappy schedule too. I don't know if it's an issue with our district manager or not, but I am not really aware of any stores in my district where the day pharmacists work 7 on, 7 off - just the night pharmacists in the 24 hour stores. Probably that is because the hours are so long in the Atlanta market that nobody wants to work 5 14 hour days in a row.

I think one reason that the schedule evolved the way it did in my store is that the one pharmacist with the child basically put her foot down and said she was not going to work at night at all, so her trade for that is a less desirable day schedule. Her partner works a lot of extra hours, so he doesn't really care because he will fill in with hours from other stores. It sort of points out one thing that I think is really important when looking at an employer - which store will you be in and what does your prospective partner want to do with the schedule?? There are many ways to schedule, but the partners have to agree or it's a mess.

 

[letjin]

Walgreens pharmacists' schedules are like this:

1st shift 8am-4pm (lunch at 2pm), 4 weekdays + 1 weekends
2nd shift 2pm-10pm, 4 weekdays + 1 weekends
overnight pharmacist 10pm-8am, 7 on 7 off

(note: the pharmacists rotate taking 1st and 2nd shifts.)

 

[WoodenCrawdad]

The 7 on 7 off doesn't sound too bad, actually. I'm curious how many pharmacies actually run this type of schedule. Seems like a tough 7 days but looking forward to a whole 7 days off...that sounds really great.

 

[Poland]

The Rite-Aid I work at has a similiar schedule of 7 on 7 off. I am amazed by this workload. I would be so tired through those 7 days on and then rebound going terribly stir-crazy during the 7 off. I would much prefer either 9-5 or a few day's work for 12 hours and a couple of days off. 9-5 actually sounds better to me. I would like a shred of the typical working routine, especially since I would be the only one unavailable for family parties, weekend trips, etc.

 

[cytogal]

The Rite-Aid I work at has a similiar schedule of 7 on 7 off. I am amazed by this workload. I would be so tired through those 7 days on and then rebound going terribly stir-crazy during the 7 off. I would much prefer either 9-5 or a few day's work for 12 hours and a couple of days off. 9-5 actually sounds better to me. I would like a shred of the typical working routine, especially since I would be the only one unavailable for family parties, weekend trips, etc.

I would love to work 7 days on then have 7 off. I'm going to ask around to see what pharmacies around me offer this option. I would love having mini vacations!!!

 

[Shizelbs]

I alternate between 42 and 38 hours per week. I have Sundays off always, work every other Saturday 10-3 and have a three day weekend every other week. I work in independent pharmacy.