So, if I go to med school after pharmacy school...

[retro]

Hello all,

I recently graduated from a pharmacy school few days ago, and I will be starting med school this coming fall. (You may wonder why I'm torturing myself like this, but there's a complicated reason behind this...)

I was wondering if I had to give up my pharmacy license once I get my medical degree.
My plan is to work as a pharmacist once a week and hopefully lessen the financial burden, and I'm sure it's legal to do this while I'm in school (and I guess not during residency?)
Is this illegal after I graduate?
I mean...common sense tells me that I can't be prescribing and dispensing oxycontin for myself, etc...but I just wanted to hear from someone who knows of anyone in the same boat.

Thank you all in advance!

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[JESSFALLING]

You may want to ask the mods to move this thread to the medical or pharmacy forums. You're more likely to find someone with practical experience with this issue there.

There are also several pharmacists on the non-trad board.

To take a stab at your question, though, there should be no reason that you need to retire your pharmacy license......other than, perhaps, lack of use and motivation to keep it. Just be careful to practice in such a way as to not run into any conflicts of interest. Personally, I'm licensed in an engineering field and I plan to keep my license after becoming a doc, even though I doubt I will ever use it. I imagine that I would be even more attached to a pharm license, if I had one.

The more interesting question, OP, is: Are there hospital-based practice situations that would benefit from dual licensure? I'm thinking that certain medication-heavy fields like Hema-Onc or Anesthesia might be good candidates? Hopefully you can successfully leverage your training and turn it into a great career. At least certain MS1/2 courses like pharmacology will seem easy!

Good luck!

 

[bassvp]

Hello all,

I recently graduated from a pharmacy school few days ago, and I will be starting med school this coming fall. (You may wonder why I'm torturing myself like this, but there's a complicated reason behind this...)

I was wondering if I had to give up my pharmacy license once I get my medical degree.
My plan is to work as a pharmacist once a week and hopefully lessen the financial burden, and I'm sure it's legal to do this while I'm in school (and I guess not during residency?)
Is this illegal after I graduate?
I mean...common sense tells me that I can't be prescribing and dispensing oxycontin for myself, etc...but I just wanted to hear from someone who knows of anyone in the same boat.

Thank you all in advance!

No, there is nothing that stops you from being licensed as a pharmacist, physician, plumber, realtor etc. at the same time (to the best of my knowledge). They are independent from one another and not mutually exclusive. However, a disciplinary action from one medical board may have to be reported to the other medical board, but other than that no one will care.

Trying to practice as both once you have a medical license would probably not be a good idea (nor could I think of a good reason to do so).

 

[Bacchus]

Hello all,

I recently graduated from a pharmacy school few days ago, and I will be starting med school this coming fall. (You may wonder why I'm torturing myself like this, but there's a complicated reason behind this...)

I was wondering if I had to give up my pharmacy license once I get my medical degree.
My plan is to work as a pharmacist once a week and hopefully lessen the financial burden, and I'm sure it's legal to do this while I'm in school (and I guess not during residency?)
Is this illegal after I graduate?
I mean...common sense tells me that I can't be prescribing and dispensing oxycontin for myself, etc...but I just wanted to hear from someone who knows of anyone in the same boat.

Thank you all in advance!

Pharmacy =/= physician assistant but I'm going to use a PA as an anecdote. When we were in our first two years, a returned PA, getting his DO, regularly worked to cover expenses.

In the future, if you want to maintain your license, you should be able to. You probably won't once you get your MD because it will be too much hassle, to much unpaid time off, etc.

The only problem I would foresee, and it's not really a problem, who be the ethical violation of writing scripts for yourself or family members and then filling them. Same goes for patients.

 

[pfaction]

Pharmacy student here, congratulations for doing this. I'm following in your footsteps! And no, I know another med student in our path who practices on the weekends/one weekday.