Difference Between Pharmacy And Clinical Pharmacy

A growing demand has emerged in the healthcare field for well-trained pharmacy technicians to assist the pharmacist in many practice settings by assuming greater responsibilities. These may include order entry, filing prescription orders, compounding sterile preparations, cart fill exchanges, inventory control, operation of automated technology, utilizing the computer system as well as fulfilling other patient specific duties. Well-trained pharmacy technicians in retail and institutional settings are a vital part of the healthcare team.

The contribution of pharmacists in a clinical setting and community pharmacy is significant that the workforce benefit from. When the workforce understands their medications and complies with the prescribed treatment plans the work center becomes healthy and the potential of increased productivity becomes a realistic and profitable proposition for the organization. When the workforce takes advantage of the healthcare services the pharmacists provide in a community and clinical pharmacies productivity and profit are at high potential reality.

I have spent my time as a student pharmacist learning about opportunities within clinical pharmacy and making certain that I was equipped with the knowledge and skills necessary to succeed. In my pursuit, I became an active member of pharmaceutical organizations, held multiple leadership positions, attended clinical conferences, established research projects, participated in community service events, and other initiatives. I excelled academically, which was manifested in not just a high academic standard but also in tutoring fellow classmates and arranging sessions with other pharmacy students to help them improve time management and study skills. I shadowed pharmacists and residents before my advanced pharmacy practice experiences commenced to discover which areas of clinical pharmacy I found intriguing. I have obtained valuable pharmacy practice experiences in five specialties thus far including inpatient internal medicine, long term acute care, geriatrics and telehealth, and primary care. Through these rotations, I built upon the knowledge I acquired from my didactic courses but also developed patient-centered approaches and strengthened my clinical skills. I enjoyed many aspects of my rotations, including contributing pharmacotherapy recommendations, providing patient education, attending rounds and interdisciplinary team meetings – all of which have solidified my desire

Studying at the West-Mec Pharmacy Technician program will eventually help me reach my long term goal of becoming a hospital pharmacist. This program will give me the benefit of hands-on training and will teach me the necessary skills that are required for a pharmacy technician. I want to have a career as a pharmacist in the future and I understand that becoming a pharmacy technician is not required, but it is a huge benefit. Pharmacists dispense medication and other remedies. They need to understand the importance of doses, allergens and other chemical reactions that may cause harm to the patients. Because of this, pharmacists are important to the medical field. I chose a pharmacist as my career because I want to ensure that my patients

Over the past century the practice of pharmacy has evolved from a field with few specialties typically focused on compounding and filling prescriptions to modern pharmacy practice which has many different specialties. Due to the many opportunities in the field of pharmacy one assignment I completed was the APhA Career Pathway Evaluation Program to see which specialties I hay have the most interest in based on a series of questions I answered. In the following paper, I will list and discuss these results, point out some of the positive and negative attributes to each career choice, and will make an assessment on which careers may be the best form me and some of the options I disagree with.

As the first generation in my family to go to college I learned the importance of education. I graduated from Benedictine University with a Bachelors in Science and an Environment Certificate. I became intregted by pharmacy when I started to spent countless hours at a hospital watching my grandfather go in and out of surgeries and treatments for cancer. Seeing the different medication being handed to him inspired me to understand biological and chemical processes that happened. A Pharmacists, role is to aim to help patients treat illness by introducing new developed treatment of medicines with a range of patients. I began to take special interest in memorizing all my grandfather’s medications and how practical and clinical aspect pharmacy worked.

Pharmacists work environment of pharmacists is usually in retail places, hospitals and research facilities. The most common retail places pharmacists work are CVS, Rite Aid, and Walgreens. In Pennsylvania alone the average amount of annual openings is 400. In Pennsylvania alone, the employment number of “pharmacists is expected to grow by seventeen percent between 2008 and 2018” (“Outlook”). The employment number increase for pharmacists is higher than any other occupation. “The reason that pharmacist job prospects are high is because employers have problems attracting pharmacists because of the limited number of PharmD programs” (“Outlook”).

When most people hear Pharmacist, they think of a drug store like Walgreens or CVS. However, a Pharmacist is capable of more than just working in a drug store. Pharmacists play a major role in healthcare today with many job opportunities. There are many different fields and career paths that a Pharmacist can choose. This essay will explore three different pharmacy careers that was examined through data collected by a survey on the internet. The three career pathways are Ambulatory Care Pharmacy, Chain Community Pharmacy, and Community Health Center Pharmacy.

When I was in high school, I had a mentor ask me, “What career would you like to have when you graduate”? Those words still lingering in my head until this day and to be honest I really didn’t know what answer to give him because I was still unsure. He then chose to put it in my mind that Pharmacy Technicians are important and they are needed just about every day. I took it upon myself to do some research. In 2010, I read that in 2009, there were approximately 267,000 pharmacists and, in 2008, 326,300 pharmacy technicians. Between 2003 and 2009, the number of pharmacists in the workforce increased by 35,000.

Pew, Stephen, Ph.D (2008). Introduction to Health Services. 7th Ed. [Video] Thomson Delmar Learning. Retrieved from:

Even students with perfect grades in high school, during undergrad, or even during pharmacy school struggle at times when going out into the world to find their ideal job as a Pharmacist. When most people think of a Pharmacist, they immediately think of a retail setting, such as CVS/Pharmacy, Giant, etc. In today's age, after going through their residency or working as a Pharmacy technician in a retail setting, most graduates do not want to be stuck in a retail pharmacy all their lives. According to a few articles online, students nationwide are struggling with these issues and more on a daily basis. We will be covering what the average pharmacy students struggle with before, during, and after pharmacy school.

There are pharmacists that work in totally different fields and their tasks require them to be specialized in different areas of pharmacy. Some of the different types of pharmacists are, Pharmaceutical technicians and Pharmaceutical scientists. Both share a general relation with each other, but they both have major differences according to what they do on a daily basis. Pharmaceutical scientists usually specialize in one aspect of the drug development process. They design new drug remedies using natural or man made ingredients, they study how disease affects the body and what causes some people to develop certain types of disease, study how the human body responds to medications so scientists can develop more efficient, safer drugs,they uncover new ways to use existing drugs to treat different types of disease, they Test drugs on animals and humans to ensure safety and efficiency, determine the most effective formulation and dosage for a specific drug, and advise corporations or government agencies, including the Food and Drug Administration, on issues related to pharmaceutical development.(Explore) To become a pharmaceutical scientist, you must have a strong interest in mathematics, biology, and chemistry. In college, you can major in the pharmaceutical sciences, pharmacy, chemistry, biology, engineering, medicine or a related field.(Explore) Pharmacy Technicians work the same hours as pharmacists. This may include evenings, nights, weekends, and holidays. Because some hospital and retail pharmacies are open 24 hours a day, technicians may work varying shifts. As their experience increases, pharmacy technicians often have increased control over the hours they work. There are many opportunities for part-time work in both retail and hospital environments.

They counsel patients on the use of medication, upon a patients release from the hospital. Retail pharmacists help answer questions about over the counter and prescription drugs. They must ask patients certain health questions in order to make a judgment on which medications to prescribe. Some pharmacists specialize in drugs for psychiatric disorders or intravenous nutrition.

For me, choosing to pursue a career in pharmacy was far from planned. I knew that I wanted to find a profession which I could find self fulfilling. So, one could say I knew as much about pharmacy and its history as an average person. I’ve always imagined that pharmacy and the entire profession as a whole was relatively modern. In other words, I never really took pharmacy as a profession with a history. I’ve always thought that pharmacy and medicine, as one, essentially made its largest strides with the technology boom of the 21st century. During my visit, I realized I was both right, but also, wrong in a sense.

Today in the 21st century the roles of pharmacist have expanded tremendously. Before pharmacist had the role of solely dispensing drugs. Pharmacists were limited to only being regulatory or clinical pharmacist. Back then they were called medical purveyors who were much like today’s regulatory pharmacist and hospital pharmacist who are similar to hospital pharmacist. Now pharmacists carry many roles in healthcare. Pharmacist can play roles in public health, community, health systems, state, and federal government.