So without going in detail what does a pharmacist generally do? This might offcourse be different fromt country to country but here in belgium people go into a pharmacy with a note from the doctor and the pharmacists gives you the medicine, the note tells the name of the medicine and how often you have to take it. The pharmacist himself doesn't make any medecines himself. However it is also a 6 year university study? I can understand why someone who makes, test and develops these medecines, or someone who diagnoses the diseases would need such a long study but why does the pharmacist needs such a long study? Do they have any additional tasks?
Here in the UK they ask you about any other meds you are taking to ensure you dont mix what shouldnt be mixed, confirm why you are taking something, or advise on over the counter items that don't need a prescription.
Does that mean that in the UK a pharmasist will also ask you what's wrong with you? Or that he will say that that particulair medicine is for example against headache?
I take over 16 medications some daily some when I need them. The pharmacist here will always check each medication and see if they will interfere with the other medications I'm taking. It is their responsibility to insure that all of my prescriptions from over 10 doctors don't combine to make a dangerous reaction happen if those compounds are mixed together. They are very important because not all of my doctors knows what the others are prescribing to me but my pharmacist does. They also can answer general questions about over the counter medications to help you choose what would be better for you with general symptoms like a cough or runny nose. If you want to know more about your medications and their side effects the pharmacist will answer those questions as well. So here they are very important people that can be of great help whenever you need it. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Right, but most professionals are able to do what pharmacists do just after taking a single pharmacology course. At the hospital, the pharmacists sit on their asses at the computer verifying the orders from the MD. They don't even fill the prescriptions. The pharmacy techs (who are trained on the job and have no education) are the ones who do unit dosing and pick out the drugs and fill up the cart, bottles, and mix the meds and prepare epidurals. After they do all the legwork, the pharmacist then gets up off his chair he was sitting on for an hour to walk around and sign off that the accuracy of the med was "verified." The drugstore pharmacists do even less work because all the drugs they are dealing with are for non-acute patients, and they aren't dealing with IV meds where dilution, compatibility of solution, and rate of administration come into play. Pharmacists do have a role, and some of what they do is very important, but they are victims of what is called "overinflated education." You used to need only 5 years of education to become a pharmacist in the USA. Now you need 8. Completely unnecessary. As if there was something wrong with pharmacy practice before pharmacy school was 4 years long post-bachelor. source: I'm a nurse
I don't know either, but they don't do that in America. In the USA, you don't even talk to the pharmacist when picking something up. The pharmacy tech will ask if you have any questions and you say no and leave. They never ask for your dx or hx.
Mine does although there are helpers there to affix the labels to the containers that they are given by the pharmisiat. Ok, when do you know which college pharmacist will be working at a hospital to fill the patients needs there?:shrug: They then will need to understand allot more than you say a "regular" pharmacist will ever know according to you. So how do you divide the two types of pharmacists into the type of education they each will need then again what if a "regular" one wants to get work at a hospital after working for a drugstore? :shrug:
Maybe they could offer two levels of education. A mid-level pharmacy practice provider for drugstores. We do that already with mid-level healthcare providers like nurse practitioners and physician assistants. As I said, you used to only be required to graduate from a master of pharmacy program (1-2 years post bachelors) in order to become a pharmacist. Only in the last 10 years did they raise the bar so that you need 4 years post-bachelors (doctor of pharmacy). What was wrong with a master's degree being the entry into the profession? All the master's prepared pharmacists have been grandfathered in, and they are working now, so it couldn't have been that bad. We do that already with mid-level healthcare providers like nurse practitioners and physician assistants.
But they never know where they will be working when they graduate from college. They need to be prepared for any environment that comes their way. Then , as I said before, they may want to transfer from drugstores into hospitals but if they aren't educated enough they can't transition.
You aren't getting what I am saying. A physician doesn't know where he's going to work when he graduates from medical school. Should we train all physicians to perform brain surgery, even if they just are going to be family practice, so that they can be prepared for anything that any environment that comes their way? No. That's why we have specializations and mid level practice. If they want to continue on to something more, they can go back to school. Also, the environment doesn't "come their way." They choose to enter into it, depending on their qualifications.
Doctors do have many areas to specialize in but pharmacists do not. You are going to stay a pharmacist if you become one and that's all there is to it. I do understand what you are saying but I guess you don't see my point at all. Perhaps this will help you. I really think it would be rather hard for a person to go back and get more education later on in life when they have a family, debts and other priorities that would come before reentering school once again plus it is harder to learn as well when you wait for 10 or 15 years. I just think that leaving the system the way it is isn't going to hurt or infringe upon anyone except those who want jobs after only 4 years of college that pay well. Then they should go into nursing as registered nurses make allot more than starting pharmacists do.
Who told you that...? I am an RN, and I'm quite sure that what you are saying is false. The min. requirement years of education for a nurse is 2 years. For a pharmacist, it's 6-8.
My neighbor makes over 50.00 an hour with overtime, that's more than a starting pharmacist isn't it? :shrug:
50 an hour? Is your neighbor starting out? I doubt it. That sounds more like the wages of a nurse manager, not a just-starting-out staff nurse. Have you considered the fact that your neighbor is exaggerating/bragging to you? Pharmacists are capable of making nearly six figures starting out. Most RNs will not make that much even after working for a long period of time.
No, she was in nursing over 15 years now. But I said that if they want to make some good money then nursing would be better with overtime and there's allot of it today. Even some newer nurses get OT allot I heard from my friend.
If she's been in nursing 15 years, and probably holds a position above a staff nurse, then it follows that she makes more than a pharmacist. However, it is not the norm for starting RNs to make more than starting pharmacists. The positive thing with nursing is that there is more room for advancement than in pharmacy. You start lower but can end higher.
By the way, drug interactions aren't caused by the compounds mixing together and creating some kind of bad substance. Drug interactions are just caused by the cumulative and synergistic effects that similar drugs have on systems of the body. It isn't as involved as you think.
To me it is because my medications will have an accumulated affect and the pharmisist will know which ones will do something to me over the long haul. Or at least I hope that they will inform me about that.
