Should I Go With Pharmacy?

[H7779]

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Initially I wanted to become a physician, however, the sight of blood doesn't make me faint, but rather "weak." This is kind of weird because if I watch documentaries about wars or war movies where gore is everywhere I'm like "yeah no biggie." If I cut my finger and bloods are dripping out of it I have no issue with it. However, if I see someone else cut their fingers or other injuries that involved blood I become "weak."

Nevertheless, I still want to help people, I want to make my life somewhat meaningful. Over Christmas, I talked to my uncle who is a Pharmacist in North Carolina. He said that if I want to help people, but don't want to see blood, then I should become a pharmacist. I want your guys input on this, other than my own family members. My questions is, should I go with it? I know that I am in my first year in college and that I have plenty of time to decide. However, I like to have some sort of plan so that I can stay focused and not wonder off into nowhere.

I am fully aware that the job market of Pharmacy is SUPER saturated, and that is due to new schools opening up and many people seeing pharmacy as an "easy" career to earn six figs a year. However, for me money is not what I am after. If it was money that I wanted, then I would just get a business degree instead, easier, faster, and lower student loans.

Currently I am volunteering at my local hospital in the pharmacy, and on top of that I will be taking my PTCB exam this upcoming Monday the 26th. Hopefully if I do pass I can get a part-time job as a pharmacy technicians.

Thanks for the help!

 

[oldstock]

Initially I wanted to become a physician, however, the sight of blood doesn't make me faint, but rather "weak." This is kind of weird because if I watch documentaries about wars or war movies where gore is everywhere I'm like "yeah no biggie." If I cut my finger and bloods are dripping out of it I have no issue with it. However, if I see someone else cut their fingers or other injuries that involved blood I become "weak."

Nevertheless, I still want to help people, I want to make my life somewhat meaningful. Over Christmas, I talked to my uncle who is a Pharmacist in North Carolina. He said that if I want to help people, but don't want to see blood, then I should become a pharmacist. I want your guys input on this, other than my own family members. My questions is, should I go with it? I know that I am in my first year in college and that I have plenty of time to decide. However, I like to have some sort of plan so that I can stay focused and not wonder off into nowhere.

I am fully aware that the job market of Pharmacy is SUPER saturated, and that is due to new schools opening up and many people seeing pharmacy as an "easy" career to earn six figs a year. However, for me money is not what I am after. If it was money that I wanted, then I would just get a business degree instead, easier, faster, and lower student loans.

Currently I am volunteering at my local hospital in the pharmacy, and on top of that I will be taking my PTCB exam this upcoming Monday the 26th. Hopefully if I do pass I can get a part-time job as a pharmacy technicians.

Thanks for the help!

If you are fully aware of the risks going in pharmacy, do not care about money, and still decide to go in, you still need to really know for yourself if you like pharmacy or not. No one can answer this for you. Volunteering / working in a pharmacy might help you gain more insights to answer your own question.

I think you should think / explore more of what you can and want to do as a career if you like to help people (which do not involve seeing any blood). Pharmacy is not the only career where you can help people medically (e.g. psychologist / psychiatrist ?? ) What do you truly like to do ??

Money is not a problem ?? Honestly, I think people who are saying money is not a problem are either full of themselves or really naive... lol 🙂

you are saying that you know well that pharmacy is supersaturated. But the prospect of becoming an unemployed / underemplyed pharmacist with 150K+ in student loans is not scary for you ??

I've just read posts from a pharmacist / DM who said that he had started to offer $40s an hour for only PT positions now for new grads... If it were true, its pretty scary going in pharmacy with all those student loans...

You don't just become an RXM out of school. You need the experience maintaining an inventory and keeping your shrink low. It takes time to learn how to do that. This is where Target screwed up by firing their older management and replacing them with new grads. Their inventories are the worst in the biz. If you are not a RXM or DM which is most pharmacist your future is grim. Here in New York State I hire kids at 45/ hr now and they take it. I offer them 35 hr per week as well. I would hate to be just getting out of school now the good days are over thanks to all the new schools that oversupplied the profession.

http://forums.studentdoctor.net/threads/what-profession-is-not-saturated.823852/page-2#post-16106802


I would think again if I were you... GL 🙂

 

[PharmtoCS]

If you go into pharmacy to "help people," then chances are that you may be disappointed. You will face metrics, workplace politics, bureaucracy, etc. that will get in the way of being able to help your patients to your content. These barriers have only gotten worse with the pharmacist saturation. Either you meet your targets and suck up to management or you get replaced by a recent grad who is willing to work for less and/or is better "liked." The ideal way would be to open your own pharmacy, but that is not easy or for everyone either.

Money may not be a concern now, but it likely will if you graduate with $200k+ in loans.

 

[oldstock]

If you go into pharmacy to "help people," then chances are that you may be disappointed. You will face metrics, workplace politics, bureaucracy, etc. that will get in the way of being able to help your patients to your content. These barriers have only gotten worse with the pharmacist saturation. Either you meet your targets and suck up to management or you get replaced by a recent grad who is willing to work for less and/or is better "liked." The ideal way would be to open your own pharmacy, but that is not easy or for everyone either.

Money may not be a concern now, but it likely will if you graduate with $200k+ in loans.

a lot of people are talking about money like it is nothing. It is not a nothing and truly deserved our respect and consideration in everything we are doing.

 

[RxEvileye]

I'd like to point out that there's still great potential to see blood as a pharmacist. Small amounts that seem to bother you based on your post are common both during pharmacy school and in most work settings.

While you give vaccines you have cotton balls and bandages ready. Patients may randomly have a little blood come out of the injection site.
You will also likely be trained to do health screenings for glucose and cholesterol that require fingerpricking. Most pharmacy schools will have you practicing all these hands-on skills early on.

Finally, you may have to rotate through hospital settings during your Advanced Pharmacy Practice Experiences or at other times. Patients can be very sick or bleeding. Working in the medical field in general will probably expose you to blood and many other gross or scary things.

 

[dosepak]

Hi H7779,

Oldstock, Stoichiometrist and RxEvileye summed up what the pharmacy profession is like. Since there are so many schools opening left and right, getting a job is harder these days than actually getting into pharmacy school. I have worked with floater pharmacists and they tell me they only get scheduled for 1-2 days a week and still have hundreds of thousands of loans to pay off. If you work as a pharmacist for a chain like CVS, then metrics will come into play. They monitor how many scripts a pharmacy does a day and week. If the script count is low or doesn't meet metrics, hours are cut. These days people are going into the local pharmacy and speaking to the pharmacist without having to pay to see their doctor. I have seen some unpleasant things that people have brought in. Bloody cuts from falling off a skateboard come to mind. I'm not trying to sway you from the pharmacy profession, just trying to show you what it's like on a day-to-day basis.

 

[CogNeuroGuy]

You should also consider an inverse perspective to this. As someone who has switched careers to psychology from music, who has worked in several industries (e.g. retail, mortgage, business, etc.) these complaints such as being metrics driven and having managers get on your case about something is what everyone else has to deal with in any profession, especially those not in a health related field. Somehow, people on this forum are expecting to find a profession where you earn 6 figures, you have low stress, not many people to answer to, and an abundant demand for the profession. If you take the time and pop into the psychology, vet or dentistry forums here, you hear the same complaints, they vary somewhat, but seriously, if all you do is worry about doom and gloom, frankly, you should have just either sucked it up to go into business or some other profession you would have been depressed in just to make money and eliminate loans. Unfortunately, we live in a society in which education is its own commodity (like any raw resource), and as such, you either have the available capital to purchase it on your own (which is not typical for working poor and middle-class families, especially first gen. college students), or you take out a loan (the #1 commodity we as Americans have, is the buying, trading and selling of debt, in all forms). As such, obviously considering the potential investment in this commodity is important, but should not consume a large proportion of the decision-making process if you can help it. If you find yourself not enjoying science or doing terrible at it, this may be an indication to re-evaluate professional plans. If you are like me, I earned 3 degrees all in 3 separate fields (music, sociology/psychology and cognitive neuroscience). I technically have learning disorders, but over the past 7 years as my brain has matured, my skills in studying matured and now I am loving things I never liked in my life, and often was scared of in high school

So, if pharmacy is something you can see yourself in, do it, I would also recommend getting exposure to other health related fields, and even unrelated fields. Find out how your intellect, goals and personality will potentially affect your ability to sustain a job and to be productive and happy in it. Worst case scenario, you get a sociology degree and work mortgage starting at $18 an hour (how fun, and I did this). My husband got into Nova's international Pharm.D. program, he came from Brazil with a M.S. in pharmacy, he started over when he moved here 7 years ago working 2 fill time jobs, going to school full time, studying for the GRE and MCAT. He loves nothing more than pharmacy (and it wasn't to help people, that wasn't his main purpose).

If you want something bad, you work your ass off for it, don't let IQ scores dissuade you from doing anything and don't let negative people dissuade you from things. If you get fired from one job, evaluate it, make sense of it in context to everything and don't catastrophize the situation and do it again...learn, adapt, make adjustments, do it again. Welcome to science 😛

 

[fewaopi]

You should also consider an inverse perspective to this. As someone who has switched careers to psychology from music, who has worked in several industries (e.g. retail, mortgage, business, etc.) these complaints such as being metrics driven and having managers get on your case about something is what everyone else has to deal with in any profession, especially those not in a health related field. Somehow, people on this forum are expecting to find a profession where you earn 6 figures, you have low stress, not many people to answer to, and an abundant demand for the profession. If you take the time and pop into the psychology, vet or dentistry forums here, you hear the same complaints, they vary somewhat, but seriously, if all you do is worry about doom and gloom, frankly, you should have just either sucked it up to go into business or some other profession you would have been depressed in just to make money and eliminate loans. Unfortunately, we live in a society in which education is its own commodity (like any raw resource), and as such, you either have the available capital to purchase it on your own (which is not typical for working poor and middle-class families, especially first gen. college students), or you take out a loan (the #1 commodity we as Americans have, is the buying, trading and selling of debt, in all forms). As such, obviously considering the potential investment in this commodity is important, but should not consume a large proportion of the decision-making process if you can help it. If you find yourself not enjoying science or doing terrible at it, this may be an indication to re-evaluate professional plans. If you are like me, I earned 3 degrees all in 3 separate fields (music, sociology/psychology and cognitive neuroscience). I technically have learning disorders, but over the past 7 years as my brain has matured, my skills in studying matured and now I am loving things I never liked in my life, and often was scared of in high school

So, if pharmacy is something you can see yourself in, do it, I would also recommend getting exposure to other health related fields, and even unrelated fields. Find out how your intellect, goals and personality will potentially affect your ability to sustain a job and to be productive and happy in it. Worst case scenario, you get a sociology degree and work mortgage starting at $18 an hour (how fun, and I did this). My husband got into Nova's international Pharm.D. program, he came from Brazil with a M.S. in pharmacy, he started over when he moved here 7 years ago working 2 fill time jobs, going to school full time, studying for the GRE and MCAT. He loves nothing more than pharmacy (and it wasn't to help people, that wasn't his main purpose).

If you want something bad, you work your ass off for it, don't let IQ scores dissuade you from doing anything and don't let negative people dissuade you from things. If you get fired from one job, evaluate it, make sense of it in context to everything and don't catastrophize the situation and do it again...learn, adapt, make adjustments, do it again. Welcome to science 😛

I agree with most of this. Many professions have their own issues, pharmacy included but I think prepharmers need to have their unrealistic expectations and optimism be met with cold reality and true stories. While I don't think the profession is going to end or there will be 80% unemployment, (20-40% seems more likely though overall will be higher as middle aged pharmacists are laid off for the younger ones), if you are the absolute best and contribute and work hard you have a decent shot at being successful. Though I'd be hard pressed to believe that those types of students can be found in newly opened, private for profit, low admission (suggesting didn't work hard, or simply not qualified) schools. If you weren't accepted into better quality, cheaper schools, then your only option is to go to a private, lower quality, easier admission, school. I'm not confident those students would have what it takes to make it in the current pharmacy job market let alone the one in 4 years. And while hard work is a merit, hard work isn't enough. If hard work was all that mattered, then everyone could be a professional athlete easily. And if all you needed to be POTUS is to work hard, then the POTUS would be an illegal Mexican with a leafblower on his back. Hard work isn't always enough, some are simply not qualified. It's why not everyone can be a physician. Instead they become a pharmacist 😉

Not discounting hard work but people's definitions of hard work varies and hard work isn't enough. You do need a brain, even for pharmacy.

 

[Alex_PharmD]

I don't understand why so many of you automatically tell people you will have $150k+ in loans when finished thats BS unless you cant make it in-state for some reason. In my opinion try to get in a pharmacy school in-state trust me I'll probably leave with $60k in loans lol and thankfully from working when I was young it will be paid off right away. But saturation does seem to be a problem but it may not be that way in every state !

 

[SanMateoRph]

$60K loans are only possible in texas and 2-3 other states but most other schools require at least doubling those loans. and wut to get a 50% chance of a job if ur lucky in retails?

 

[Alex_PharmD]

$60K loans are only possible in texas and 2-3 other states but most other schools require at least doubling those loans. and wut to get a 50% chance of a job if ur lucky in retails?

I totally agree and I am looking towards changing my career altogether wish I hadn't chosen this path from the first place didn't even know how badly they are destroying the pharmacy profession its really sad my long time dream job is now long gone all because of greed and opening new schools left and right!!

 

[Lucky One]

I'll think community setting you'll find something especially if you start being a tech now and work your way up as well as with your uncle's connections. However I can't gauge your worth ethic/smartness, but assuming those are normal, you'll definitely have to put in more in order to secure a future for yourself as the field of pharmacy is definitely getting more competitive. It's not doom and gloom in terms of overall employment but if your a sub par student/worker in general I would be worried. Passion alone doesn't cut it anymore.

If I was you and I couldn't get into a decent school I wouldn't even attempt at the private lower-tiered ones. My 2 cents. Coming from a first year P1 student.

 

[sdpharm]

If you have a true passion for Pharmacy, go through with it. But, like many others have stated, don't be surprised if your stressing about the extremely low number of job openings.

I work at CVS Pharmacy as a pharmacy technician, and have spoken to plenty of pharmacist floaters; all stating that they have been scrounging for hours to work. The struggle for Pharmacists is real out there, please beware.

 

[PharmHopefulLonghorn2015]

I thought pharmacy school at one point didn't involve blood either. Flu shot mandates are now being imposed on pharmacists. A bonus for surpassing a quota, and a mean grumpy supervisor for not.

 

[RxStudentatUB]

IMHO, you should have went with pharmacy 10 years ago LOL. But, we were not old enough to be in high school by then. So we just have to work with the things we've got.

 

[SClENCE]

Does anybody truly go into pharmacy to help people?

People want their pills as FAST as possible and as CHEAP as possible. They only want your help when it requires you doing things that THEY should be doing... such as calling their doctor to get refills because they skipped their appointment.

Don't get me wrong... I feel great when I can help a patient but these types of patients are few and far between.

Just my rant. I enjoy pharmacy because I find pharmacokinetics interesting. Sadly as I exit school and enter retail this knowledge will slowly drain from my head as I tell a customer that the toilet paper is in isle 5 and ask to scan their extracare card while bagging their groceries.