working in retail essentail?

[badxmojo]

I'm about to start pharm school..and from alot of the threads i've read in this forum.. I've gotten feeling that working in retail is something that people definetly reccomend inorder to learn the top 200. I was hoping to work in a hospital since that is what i want to do when i graduate.. do you think working in a retail pharmacy where your gonna be exposed to the myriad number of drugs every day will better prepare you for the boards?

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[LVPharm]

I've pretty much come to the conclusion that regardless of where you want to end up, working in a retail internship (outside of the rotations required for school) may be very helpful in learning your drugs and preparing you for the board exam. I hear it from practicing pharmacists in both hospital and retail, and from some of the 3rd year pharm students I know. You only see what's on the hospital formulary, and depending on the setup of the pharmacy, you may not get much exposure to the oral medication (we have a robot doing oral unit dose dispensing and credit returns and McKesson techs operating it). All I get to do at the place I work is IV admixture preparation, so all I get to see are the parenteral drugs.

 

[badxmojo]

hmm thats what i figured.. this is definetly something i'm gonna dread.. but it'll toughen me up i guess.. maybe ive just heard to many horrow stories about retail..i'm sure it has its bright spots..

 

[StevenS]

ideally you should get some experience in both environments.
however experiences of a hospital intern can be quite different. many hospitals have very large formularies, and even the more restrictive ones will usually include most of the top 200 drugs that boards focus on. but again some jobs will allow you exposure to a wide variety of drugs and their applications, while some other jobs will just use you as a robot. you will not learn much in those positions , and you may well be better off in retail.

 

[WVUPharm2007]

I've work in a hospital pharmacy for 1.5 years, no retail experience ever; I saw a copy of the "Top 200 movers" and not one was new to me. Of course my director doesn't really have a formulary to speak of and buys anything the drug rep at the door is peddling, so my experience is probably not something to go by.