Pharmacy School Labs - Difficulty level

[PharmNoob]

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I tend to have a hard time reading lab manuals and usually the last one to leave labs, and constantly asking the instructor for help. Is this a clear indicator that I am not going to be a good pharmacist. However, I do fine with the other part of the class ... the "book stuff" and managed to get an A in the class. (This is general chem II at a community college BTW).

Also, I find this class to be very challenging and from what I have heard.. this was the hardest chem teacher in my school. Overall, the material wasn't too hard but she was very demanding and never really gave us a break. During the wild fires in California, the school was shut down but she emailed us homework and quizzes for those few days.. i know i shouldn't be makin excuses or crying like a baby but If i was struggling through with this class, how prepared will be in the near future. I was also taking a life science bio and a general biology class along with this course.

How is pharmacy school like. Does it focus more on organic chem and bio-chem.. I haven't taken those courses yet but after taking biology, i feel like that is where my strengths are at.

How are the labs and lab write ups for pharmacy schools? I hear they are easier, but I could be completely wrong... i guess my smarts are in books rather than in a lab environment.

 

[doctorpharm2010]

Pharmacy school is nothing like that, trust me. Have you been admitted to a pharm school yet? If you have not, then work hard on your classes and applications to gain admission. If you have, then complete all the requirements that are left then enjoy yourself. Don't worry about what's actually in pharmacy school right now because it is way to early for that. But then again, all I can tell you is forget about lab reports and lab manual and whatsoever, pharm school is nothing like that.

 

[pinkyrx]

I thought "labs" in pharmacy school were super easy compared to organic lab and classes like that in undergrad. I can remember spending 5 hours a day, several days a week in organic lab! I absolutely hated it!

I see that you haven't had organic/biochem labs yet... chances are they are going to be way more difficult than the labs you've had so far, but they're just something you've got to make it through (successfully) if you want to get into pharmacy school. I said this in another thread, but I really do think that getting into pharmacy school is the hardest part!

Depending on what school you go to, you probably won't even have an actual chemistry lab. We had a compounding lab class, but that was a blast! Follow the recipe, just like cooking in my opinion.

 

[mike36]

I can't speak for other pharm schools, but at UT Austin, most of the labs are for calculations. For instance, in Pchem last semester we had a lab that went with the lecture, but we didn't do any actual chemistry. It was just for calculations that we didn't go over in lecture.

I believe at UT, there are only two actual chemistry labs in the curriculum (only finished my first semester, so not 100% sure). They are pharmaceutics (compounding) and IV admixtures. I've heard that they aren't so bad though.

 

[sleazye]

I thought the labs so far in pharmacy school are much more difficult than undergrad chem labs. In undergrad it seemed like as long as you did the lab and wrote a decent lab report you got most of the points. In pharm school so far our lab reports have ranged from 5-20+ pages and I never got full credit on any of them. Really frustrating when you spend 10+ hours on a lab report only to get a 70%. Labs have been mostly analytical chem, drug assay type stuff. A logical extension of OChem labs: HPLC, UV-Vis, Southern Blotting, etc. I hope it gets better cause I don't really enjoy this stuff.

 

[kbv]

I tend to have a hard time reading lab manuals and usually the last one to leave labs, and constantly asking the instructor for help. Is this a clear indicator that I am not going to be a good pharmacist. However, I do fine with the other part of the class ... the "book stuff" and managed to get an A in the class. (This is general chem II at a community college BTW).

Also, I find this class to be very challenging and from what I have heard.. this was the hardest chem teacher in my school. Overall, the material wasn't too hard but she was very demanding and never really gave us a break. During the wild fires in California, the school was shut down but she emailed us homework and quizzes for those few days.. i know i shouldn't be makin excuses or crying like a baby but If i was struggling through with this class, how prepared will be in the near future. I was also taking a life science bio and a general biology class along with this course.

How is pharmacy school like. Does it focus more on organic chem and bio-chem.. I haven't taken those courses yet but after taking biology, i feel like that is where my strengths are at.

How are the labs and lab write ups for pharmacy schools? I hear they are easier, but I could be completely wrong... i guess my smarts are in books rather than in a lab environment.

1. Can you do some readings of the manual prior to the lab?
2. Having a demanding professor/course is bittersweet. Bitter because you have sleepless nights, stress, fear, and sweats, but ask anyone if he/she doesn't sacrifice anything to gain something. Sweet because I'd rather get trained in the hardship to face hardship than thrown in the hardship all of the sudden. Again, it's survival.
3.& 4. Depending on the pharmacy school. You must complete Gen and Org prior to pharmacy professional years.
Bio- and Med-chem are in P1 and P2 and they don't have labs at all.

 

[PharmNoob]

Are the labs worth a significant portion of your grade or does it emphasize more on your tests.

How are the support groups in pharmacy schools? For this class, I managed to pull an "A" but it was probably b/c i attended a chem workshop during that semester. The guy who ran the workshop also had the instructor's old tests which helped a lot.. im not sure if this counts as cheating or not, but i feel like i probably wouldn't have gotten an A without that help. Do you get help like this in pharmacy school? Or are you completely lost to how the format and type of questions a pharmacy test are each time?

sorry for all the questions, but i really need to find out if i am capable of pharmacy school..

 

[kbv]

Are the labs worth a significant portion of your grade or does it emphasize more on your tests.

How are the support groups in pharmacy schools? For this class, I managed to pull an "A" but it was probably b/c i attended a chem workshop during that semester. The guy who ran the workshop also had the instructor's old tests which helped a lot.. im not sure if this counts as cheating or not, but i feel like i probably wouldn't have gotten an A without that help. Do you get help like this in pharmacy school? Or are you completely lost to how the format and type of questions a pharmacy test are each time?

sorry for all the questions, but i really need to find out if i am capable of pharmacy school..

1. "Are the labs worth a significant portion of your grade or does it emphasize more on your tests.": Labs of Gen or Org may be worth up to 30% of the whole course.

2. Do you really think that having the old exams alone can help you earn a good grade? You know, your professors are smart. You really never think he/she would not notice of this? Sometimes, your professors will distribute the old exams to their students as preferences or guidelines. When you are lost, talk to the professor to get help.

 

[PharmNoob]

There were worth a good amount, 30%-35% of the overall grade. I especially had a rough time with qualitative analysis labs and lab writeups. I would ask the professor questions after classes, go to office hours, read my book for help and then usually go on the internet to seek for help for previous labs or equations, etc. - again, not sure if this is a good idea/habit and this is probably not what an admitted pharmacy student would do; am i cheating myself into pharmacy school and then end up failing in the long run...?

i mean, i spent a lot of time in this course to get an "A", and not sure if i can match up to the many pharmacy students (if i am even able to admitted)....

do you guys just pick this thing up easily or go through this hardcore studying as well?

 

[kbv]

There were worth a good amount, 30%-35% of the overall grade. I especially had a rough time with qualitative analysis labs and lab writeups. I would ask the professor questions after classes, go to office hours, read my book for help and then usually go on the internet to seek for help for previous labs or equations, etc. - again, not sure if this is a good idea/habit and this is probably not what an admitted pharmacy student would do; am i cheating myself into pharmacy school and then end up failing in the long run...?

i mean, i spent a lot of time in this course to get an "A", and not sure if i can match up to the many pharmacy students (if i am even able to admitted)....

do you guys just pick this thing up easily or go through this hardcore studying as well?

Keep up with these good routines. Good job. Keep training yourself like this and you'll have no problem in your pharmacy school.

 

[PharmNoob]

thanks for your words of encouragement kbv.

 

[twester]

My school doesn't have any labs whatsoever. I really can't imagine what the point would be (except for compounding, which would be a nice addition to the curriculum).

 

[Pharmcdc]

We had an A&P lab during our first year. We also had two semesters of pharmaceutics lec & lab. In our ceutics lab we had pre-lab assignments where we were often required to research drugs that are not commercially available either in a certain dosage form or not available for certain patient populations (i.e. infants) and how we could compound it for the individual. We also had post-lab assignments. Often we would have pre-lab quizes which would include info from the previous weeks lab and the material we should have studied for the current weeks lab. Needless to say, we were extremely glad when ceutics was over!😀

I think it depends on the school you go to. COP curriculums cover the same basics with emphasis on different things/areas. Also how the material is presented can vary greatly, and the individual instructor has a lot to do with it as well. At my school, the lab and lec are one grade, but you must get 70% in each individually to pass the class. After saying all of that though, over all, labs should not be a problem.