what do pharmacy students do during their 4th year rotations? Is this the same as being a student intern? From what I understand, student begin interning from the start of their first year but rotations are typically done during the last year. What's the difference?
rotations vs. interns?
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Hi current pharmacy students. I was just wondering if you can shed light of the difference between rotations and interns?
what do pharmacy students do during their 4th year rotations? Is this the same as being a student intern? From what I understand, student begin interning from the start of their first year but rotations are typically done during the last year. Besides this whats the difference?
what do pharmacy students do during their 4th year rotations? Is this the same as being a student intern? From what I understand, student begin interning from the start of their first year but rotations are typically done during the last year. Besides this whats the difference?
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Rotations are "supposed" to prepare you to be a pharmacist. Some are better than others. The main difference is that you are more accountable on rotations for making decisions since you are in your last year of school and about to be a pharmacist. As an intern, you basically work as a tech with a few extra duties if you work in retail (taking oral prescriptions, prescription transfers, etc).
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Agreed.
I thought interns work in exchange for school hours. So you're telling me that they get paid on top of getting school hours?
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Pharmacy Internship (is acquired outside of the school, your employer is the hospital, pharmacy, etc) - You get paid money, counts towards hours for license.
IPPE - you pay the school to work/learn at the site (don't count)
APPE - you pay the school to work/learn at the site (these don't count towards hours for license)
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It depends on the state you're seeking to be licensed in. For example, GA requires 1500 hours to sit for the boards. 1000 hours come from pharmacy school for completing the curriculum and the other 500 need to be obtained from an internship (like a job, you apply to them yourself and get paid while working). As for rotations, they are required to be completed (pass/fail, or grade C or better) for you to graduate so they are part of your pharmacy school curriculum. Rotations are typically done during 4th or final year of pharmacy school when you rotate in different pharmacy settings (acute care, ambulatory care, infectious disease, international, etc) and these may be assigned to you by the school or you may pick them (depends on the school). Since rotations are part of your curriculum you pay for them like tuition and do not get paid (you are called extern instead of intern then, at least that's how it works in GA).
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Nope.
Intern is a job that is paid, but those hours count toward state licensing requirements (if applicable).
Rotations are like extended classrooms for students to learn. Those hours earned count toward school graduation requirements and sometimes state licensing requirements.
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Thread merged with the one that was also in the Pre-Pharm forum. Figured you would get better responses here.
One difference is that you may be obtain to obtain an intern position when you start pharmacy school and stay with the same company through pharmacy school (not that everyone does).
Rotations are typically a specified number of weeks at a time (ex. 4-8) where you are focusing on one type of practice or patient population and then you switch to a different area. For example, my fourth year rotations (10 months of rotations) included emergency medicine, medical writing, community practice (MTMs and teaching at the college - not serving as a technician), an elective, neonatal intensive care (babies as young as 24 weeks gestation), and ambulatory medicine. It can be nice to obtain exposure to a lot of different areas quickly. The focus of rotations should be on learning.
Rotations are typically a specified number of weeks at a time (ex. 4-8) where you are focusing on one type of practice or patient population and then you switch to a different area. For example, my fourth year rotations (10 months of rotations) included emergency medicine, medical writing, community practice (MTMs and teaching at the college - not serving as a technician), an elective, neonatal intensive care (babies as young as 24 weeks gestation), and ambulatory medicine. It can be nice to obtain exposure to a lot of different areas quickly. The focus of rotations should be on learning.
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An intern position is a job. An intern can differ from a tech because under certain state laws an intern may not need to be licensed/registered with the state and may also legally take on more pharmacy responsibilities like immunizing and providing patient counselling.
A rotation is part of your school curriculum. You are sent to a site to "lean" and receive a grade for it.
A rotation is part of your school curriculum. You are sent to a site to "lean" and receive a grade for it.
