Pharmacy Questions

220110

I'm currently studying for my leaving cert and I really like the idea of studying pharmacy. I don't really know why I want to do it, I just do. I suppose the idea of owning my own business and combining this with science really appeals to me.
The only problem is that anyone I have talked to seems to be advising me against it including my guidance teacher who says that he doesn't think there is any hope of a job here for at least the next 20 years! Also how is the situation abroad as I'm planning on getting out of here as soon as I qualify?
Also how intense is the course? Like I'm dedicated and all that, but I'm really big into sport and want to be able to continue to Improve in my sport right throughout college.
I know there is probably going to be a bit of bias when this question is answered but, which course(include overall college experience) is the best and why?(TCD, UCC or RCSI)

Cheers:D:D

EDIT: Sorry Mods didn't see the education sub thread. Feel free to move this!! <Mod Edit: Done!>

locum-motion

I'm only going to give a brief answer now; may come back tomorrow and answer in more detail.

Anyway, 2 things:

If Pharmacy's really what you want, don't discount the UK schools as an option.

If I knew then what I know now, I don't think I'd study Pharmacy.

angeldelight

I think at the minute the response you will get from most if not all pharmacists on the site is going to be a negative one - however keep in mind that, in my opinion, that would be the same in many professions due to the general economic climate. Pharmacy has been badly hit even before the recession though with some changes pushed through by Mary Harney though.

So in saying that - if you think you're genuinely interested then do it. I'm a newly qualified pharmacist (literally, qualified 5 weeks) and so far I love it. I'm doing locums at the moment as there are no jobs out there and I never feel like I'm going to work, it feels like doing something I quite like and am being paid for. That is probably just the novelty of the thing but it's where I am at the moment.

If you search back on posts of mine I've answered loads of questions about pharmacy in RCSI and in general it was a good course. Compared to Trinity it's a newer course with more of an emphasis on clinical pharmacy rather than the general science from the beginning. Anecdotally, RCSI graduates are being well received and have had some good feedback on the knowledge they come out with. I'm not saying TCD and UCC are worse or anything, thats just what I've been told by some other pharmacists (who interestingly went to TCD).

The course is intense but everyone in my class who wanted a mad social life still managed to have one so I'm sure you could keep up the sport. In RCSI 3rd year is the worst but 4th year is a welcome relief after it anyway!

So as I said, have a search through some of my old posts and if you've any other questions I'll do my best to answer them

bleg

I'm currently doing the 5th year of study for pharmacy (the MPharm year).


I'll have to strongly advise you not to do pharmacy at all.

Nonoperational

Course is grand. No worries there. Some hard parts some easy.

I find the job pretty boring. You use very little science when you actually work as a pharmacist. You are basically comparing packs and labels against whats written on the prescription. Sometimes there are more interesting things like interactions etc but 95% of the job could be done by a trained monkey. Personally I think the only way to have a satisfying career is to try buy a pharmacy and you have the business side of it to look after which could be good. I don't mean to offend any pharmacists if you think differently more power to you I am just giving an honest answer as to how I feel about it. Saying that if you get the points to do it and have an interest in science then it's a good course. You basically have a science degree with the added bonus of being a pharmacist too.

Jobs are thin on the ground however there is still the odd locum day around. Loads of jobs in the UK apparently.

On an aside, how are the other pharmacists finding the locum situation at the moment? Getting many days?

locum-motion

locum-motion wrote: »

I'm only going to give a brief answer now; may come back tomorrow and answer in more detail.

Anyway, 2 things:

If Pharmacy's really what you want, don't discount the UK schools as an option.

If I knew then what I know now, I don't think I'd study Pharmacy.

Why is this Locum-motion?

Anthony16

220110 wrote: »

I'm currently studying for my leaving cert and I really like the idea of studying pharmacy. I don't really know why I want to do it, I just do. I suppose the idea of owning my own business and combining this with science really appeals to me.
The only problem is that anyone I have talked to seems to be advising me against it including my guidance teacher who says that he doesn't think there is any hope of a job here for at least the next 20 years! Also how is the situation abroad as I'm planning on getting out of here as soon as I qualify?
Also how intense is the course? Like I'm dedicated and all that, but I'm really big into sport and want to be able to continue to Improve in my sport right throughout college.
I know there is probably going to be a bit of bias when this question is answered but, which course(include overall college experience) is the best and why?(TCD, UCC or RCSI)

Cheers:D:D

EDIT: Sorry Mods didn't see the education sub thread. Feel free to move this!! <Mod Edit: Done!>

If u really feel its a vocation then i would definitely do it,but dont go into it for the money as it seems there will be little money in pharmacy for a long time to come.
However,the other healthcare professions will be in trouble in the future aswell(physio,vet med,med)

pampootie

I'm a pharmacist and I wouldn't really advise you doing it, based on the reasons you mentioned. The chances of you owning your own business will be very very slim in coming years and its becoming a highly unattractive prospect for many. I certainly wouldn't take on the burden of a pharmacy for love nor money. You mentioned leaving-where are you thinking? The UK is almost all large chains and again owning your own would be unlikely.

What area of pharmacy are you planning on going into? Community, industry, hospital? Community-make sure you like working with people and can handle retail. Hospital-you'll prob have to leave for the UK or further afield, the recruitment embargo has meant virtually no jobs here. Industry I know virtually nothing about to be honest.

I don't mean to sound negative about the profession. I do love it, I work as a locum for various community pharmacies and I find it very rewarding. The reasons I love it are: I find drugs and how they work so so fascinating. I like meeting heaps of people every day and I don't mind retail work. I like helping people and giving advice. If they sound like things you identify with, go for it. Jobs are getting scarce and salary is lowering but if you enjoy your work it shouldn't be all about money anyway.

What I would advise you to do is some work experience in a pharmacy for a week over your easter holidays, and get a feel for it. Your reasons dont seem very strong at the moment and I know quite a few people who ended up in pharmacy for similar, loose reasons and hate it now. Many are retraining. Pharmacy is going through a rough time and if you dont have a passion for the job itself you'll naturally be disheartened. The same is true for all professions.

220110

bleg wrote: »

I'm currently doing the 5th year of study for pharmacy (the MPharm year).
I'll have to strongly advise you not to do pharmacy at all.

Why??

pampootie wrote: »

I'm a pharmacist and I wouldn't really advise you doing it, based on the reasons you mentioned. The chances of you owning your own business will be very very slim in coming years and its becoming a highly unattractive prospect for many. I certainly wouldn't take on the burden of a pharmacy for love nor money. You mentioned leaving-where are you thinking? The UK is almost all large chains and again owning your own would be unlikely.

What area of pharmacy are you planning on going into? Community, industry, hospital? Community-make sure you like working with people and can handle retail. Hospital-you'll prob have to leave for the UK or further afield, the recruitment embargo has meant virtually no jobs here. Industry I know virtually nothing about to be honest.

I don't mean to sound negative about the profession. I do love it, I work as a locum for various community pharmacies and I find it very rewarding. The reasons I love it are: I find drugs and how they work so so fascinating. I like meeting heaps of people every day and I don't mind retail work. I like helping people and giving advice. If they sound like things you identify with, go for it. Jobs are getting scarce and salary is lowering but if you enjoy your work it shouldn't be all about money anyway.

What I would advise you to do is some work experience in a pharmacy for a week over your easter holidays, and get a feel for it. Your reasons dont seem very strong at the moment and I know quite a few people who ended up in pharmacy for similar, loose reasons and hate it now. Many are retraining. Pharmacy is going through a rough time and if you dont have a passion for the job itself you'll naturally be disheartened. The same is true for all professions.

Hey thanks!
I'm not really sure where I want to go yet Possibly Oz, the states or Germany. However, I'm certain that I wont be staying here.
I really do believe that this is the right job for me, like I like helping people, I have always found medicine interesting and I have 100% confidence that I would enjoy the retail part of the job.
My original idea was to study a course like biochemistry or pharmacology but tbh what really put me off this, was the prospect of spending all of my time in a lab.
I got down to the local pharmacy for 2 days over Christmas and really enjoyed it but my main problem is that I'm under pressure for the points so I really don't have the time over easter. I applied to ucas as a back up but I really would prefer to do it here.

pampootie

no bother

if you think its the right job for you, go for it. you've said you like science, you like people, you dont want to be stuck in a lab-i reckon pharmacy would suit you. there is so much doom and gloom about at the moment surrounding it but you cant take all of it to heart. I completely understand you not wanting to take the time away from study at easter, and since you've done some days already you've got the feel for it.

As for where you want to travel to, I'm not too sure about the situations in other countries. There used to be a kind of mutual recognition of the degree between here and Oz i think, but whatever it was was changed about 2/3 years ago and I believe that now there's a sort of "pre-reg" type period of time where you work with another pharmacist for a short while and then do their licence exam. In the USA I believe you have to do a separate licence exam for each state. Germany I've no notion about. (completely open to correction on the whole Oz/USA situations as well, may be completely wrong here!)

As an aside I also reckon that points will fall a bit this year for pharmacy. Where are you applying to through UCAS? I had friends who went to RGU and UEA and both loved it.

220110

pampootie wrote: »

no bother

if you think its the right job for you, go for it. you've said you like science, you like people, you dont want to be stuck in a lab-i reckon pharmacy would suit you. there is so much doom and gloom about at the moment surrounding it but you cant take all of it to heart. I completely understand you not wanting to take the time away from study at easter, and since you've done some days already you've got the feel for it.

As for where you want to travel to, I'm not too sure about the situations in other countries. There used to be a kind of mutual recognition of the degree between here and Oz i think, but whatever it was was changed about 2/3 years ago and I believe that now there's a sort of "pre-reg" type period of time where you work with another pharmacist for a short while and then do their licence exam. In the USA I believe you have to do a separate licence exam for each state. Germany I've no notion about. (completely open to correction on the whole Oz/USA situations as well, may be completely wrong here!)

As an aside I also reckon that points will fall a bit this year for pharmacy. Where are you applying to through UCAS? I had friends who went to RGU and UEA and both loved it.

Yeah I think you're right about the whole pre-reg thing. That's how my guidence teacher said it is anyway.
Hopefully you're right about the points. They should fall as it isn't seen as as much as an "easy money" job anymore, although, an across the board increase in points for all courses is expected, as the colleges are expected to cut down on the no. of students they accept, due to their money from the government being cut, so its hard to tell really.
I applied to RGU, UEA, Uni Ulster, Sunderland and Norwich, with RGU being my preferred out of all of them. Ive heard some really good reports from there and the sports setup is meant to be amazing!! I only sent off my app. last week so haven't heard anything back yet.

pampootie

Good luck with it! As far as courses here I would put RCSI on top of the list. It's a really good course, very clinically based and interesting.
If you've any more questions ask away!

locum-motion

Deleted User wrote: »

Why is this Locum-motion?

What Pampootie said. Pretty much covered what I wanted to say.

pampootie wrote: »

I'm a pharmacist and I wouldn't really advise you doing it, based on the reasons you mentioned. The chances of you owning your own business will be very very slim in coming years and its becoming a highly unattractive prospect for many. I certainly wouldn't take on the burden of a pharmacy for love nor money. You mentioned leaving-where are you thinking? The UK is almost all large chains and again owning your own would be unlikely.

What area of pharmacy are you planning on going into? Community, industry, hospital? Community-make sure you like working with people and can handle retail. Hospital-you'll prob have to leave for the UK or further afield, the recruitment embargo has meant virtually no jobs here. Industry I know virtually nothing about to be honest.

I don't mean to sound negative about the profession. I do love it, I work as a locum for various community pharmacies and I find it very rewarding. The reasons I love it are: I find drugs and how they work so so fascinating. I like meeting heaps of people every day and I don't mind retail work. I like helping people and giving advice. If they sound like things you identify with, go for it. Jobs are getting scarce and salary is lowering but if you enjoy your work it shouldn't be all about money anyway.

What I would advise you to do is some work experience in a pharmacy for a week over your easter holidays, and get a feel for it. Your reasons dont seem very strong at the moment and I know quite a few people who ended up in pharmacy for similar, loose reasons and hate it now. Many are retraining. Pharmacy is going through a rough time and if you dont have a passion for the job itself you'll naturally be disheartened. The same is true for all professions.

locum-motion

220110 wrote: »

I applied to RGU, UEA, Uni Ulster, Sunderland and Norwich, with RGU being my preferred out of all of them. Ive heard some really good reports from there and the sports setup is meant to be amazing!! I only sent off my app. last week so haven't heard anything back yet.

I'm an RGU grad myself, and although I'm a bit disillusioned about the profession in Ireland at the moment (hence my posts above), I really enjoyed the course, RGU and Aberdeen.

bleg

You've got 5 years of hard slog ahead of you in University/Internship. For me, the rewards aren't there to justify the amount of hard work or sacrifice that students have to put in to become a pharmacist. You get screwed over by the universities, the PSI(regulator), the Government, the public at large and by other members of the profession. You'll be working weekends, evenings, bank holidays and around Christmas. You'll be subject to verbal abuse and physical intimidation by members of the public. You will have to pay an expensive registration fee to the regulator to allow you to do all of this.


Seriously, unless you're a masochist don't do it.

revz

This thread has scared me a bit
I did my leaving cert last year, and got the points for pharmacy in RCSI but missed out because my guidance councillor didn't tell the NUI/CAO i was exempt from irish and i wasnt offered a place, when i tried to correct it they said i missed out on random selection or something (was a serious kick in the balls).
Anyway, I've re-applied to the CAO & this year to UCAS, as I've always thought i wanted to do pharmacy & always thought there would be more/better job opportunities than the current medicinal chemistry course im doing in trinity...
Am I correct in thinking that?

bleh!

revz wrote: »

This thread has scared me a bit
I did my leaving cert last year, and got the points for pharmacy in RCSI but missed out because my guidance councillor didn't tell the NUI/CAO i was exempt from irish and i wasnt offered a place, when i tried to correct it they said i missed out on random selection or something (was a serious kick in the balls).
Anyway, I've re-applied to the CAO & this year to UCAS, as I've always thought i wanted to do pharmacy & always thought there would be more/better job opportunities than the current medicinal chemistry course im doing in trinity...
Am I correct in thinking that?

We would have been in the same class :eek: btw, there's a few people in my class who came from Med Chem in TCD. In terms of areas to expand on, I'd say Pharmacy would have more but then again, jobs are just not around at the moment(as with a lot of different fields) but obviously we can only hope for the best

bleg

Going to be tough, but the whole thing could have changed by the time you all come out. Personally I prefer the industrial side of being a pharmacist.

bleh!

bleg wrote: »

Going to be tough, but the whole thing could have changed by the time you all come out. Personally I prefer the industrial side of being a pharmacist.

I would much prefer industry/hospital over community too but it might be too early to pick one just yet. Anyway, was this crisis expected to come(too much graduates,etc.) or was it just because of the recession? Also, would I be correct to assume that the MPharm would now give pharmacists more opportunities,ie. emigrate to US, or was it just the same old Irish Bpharm?

bleg

~Well it's a Level 9 Masters programme that's more easily recognisable than the previous MPSI, pharmacists could always work in the States though but this just makes it easier.


It's the perfect storm, reduced drug costs leads to reduced margins, increased graduates, the recession, cuts to the markup on DPS, dispensing fee adjustments, chains moving in, deregulation along with the high number of pharmacies.

darling1

whats pharmacy in UCC like??

JSK 252

darling1 wrote: »

whats pharmacy in UCC like??

****e.

amjon.

Pharmacy is an absolute **** storm, it's a bit better here in the UK but even at that remote supervision is looming on the horizon. I would strongly advise anyone considering it to avoid it if they intend on working in community

darling1

JSK 252 wrote: »

****e.

Is it really that bad??I know its heavy workload and all,but is the course itself bad??Thanks

bleg

darling1 wrote: »

Is it really that bad??I know its heavy workload and all,but is the course itself bad??Thanks

Nah it's grand.

amjon.

amjon. wrote: »

Pharmacy is an absolute **** storm, it's a bit better here in the UK but even at that remote supervision is looming on the horizon. I would strongly advise anyone considering it to avoid it if they intend on working in community

Remote supervision.I am still not sure what to make of it.

bleg

What's this remote supervision craic about?

If you've any questions about the UCC course you can PM me, I'll try my best to answer them.

bleg

bleg wrote: »

What's this remote supervision craic about?

If you've any questions about the UCC course you can PM me, I'll try my best to answer them.

Means that the pharmacist does not have to be present to dispense the drugs. It can be done by webcam. So you could have 1 pharmacist dispensing at 4 shops.

bleg

Deleted User wrote: »

Means that the pharmacist does not have to be present to dispence the drugs. It can be done by webcam. So you could have 1 pharmacist dispensing at 4 shops.

Ridiculous.

Blondie1988

Hi there, I am thinking off applying to the graduate course in rcsi. I gather that its less scientific and more patient focused than tcd? Im worried that I might find the chemistry side of things difficult, how bad is it? thanks guys!