Personal Statement Essay : My Career In Pharmacy

What do you want to do with your life? It is a question that almost everyone asks high school and college students, but for many, it is a dreaded question that is difficult to answer. For me, that wasn’t the case, as ever since my sophomore year of high school, my answer has been to become a pharmacist. My passion for pharmacy stemmed out of the opportunity to shadow a pharmacist who showed me a wide variety of career possibilities within pharmacy. I was intrigued by all the options that began on the foundation of learning science, understanding medications, and caring for patients.

Pharmacy is a prolific field of study that is taking a prime position in the world of academia. It is quite demanding and needs completeness and vigilance. Thus, by going through pre-pharmacy, it will help me reshape my educational and career aspirations by bringing into reality what pharmacy entails through prerequisite coursework. I will also be able to come to terms with what the profession has at the end of the tunnel and asses with it marches my career goals. The profession is loaded with numerous employment and personal advancement opportunities, and I am motivated to study pre-pharmacy since it will spark of my innovativeness and optimistic that my future days would be worth the trouble.

My childhood unleashed a desire to know how things worked and why things happened; this soon flourished into a more specific interest in the field of Pharmacy. Medicine fascinated me, driving my obsession to understand all of the dynamics of pharmaceutical drugs. My studies in Biology at New Jersey City University, and my current occupation as a Certified Pharmacy Technician, led my desire to go further with my education in pursing an advanced degree as a Doctor of Pharmacy. My undergraduate career has prepared me extensively, such as requiring that I take on a wide range of science-based courses including Biochemistry, Genetics, and Microbiology. My hard work and dedication led to me being on the Dean's List for a number of semesters. I was also honored to be part of The National Honor Society of Leadership and Success and The Tri-Beta Biological Honor Society.

My Butler University academic training and intern experience has positioned me to recognize and appreciate the essential role performed by the clinical pharmacist. Although sometimes transparent, it is the clinical pharmacist that is central to a patient’s ultimate successful recovery. This was evident during my clinical rotations, where I directly participated in the optimization of medication therapy to achieve patient-specific outcomes; it is for this reason I am impassioned and compelled to pursue a residency. As a PGY-1 resident, I plan to apply my clinical knowledge in the acute and ambulatory care settings to identify medication-related problems and make therapeutic recommendations in collaboration with other practitioners. Upon completion

Growing up in a family where my father worked as a pharmacist with both my older sister and older brother selecting pharmacy as their profession, I would be lying if I said that this did not serve to influence my decision-making in any form or shape. It was not until my freshman year of high school when I chose to volunteer at my aunt’s independently-owned pharmacy that formally opened its doors for business that I began to seriously consider my future profession. Initially, because business was severely slow and lacking, I did not find much interest in the field of pharmacy as I was primarily spending my time setting up equipment, organizing the store, and moving boxes around among others. It was not until a few years later when the business started picking up steam and more customers began to file in that allowed me to further interact with more people and consequently, increase the variety of drug medications that the pharmacy had in stock. In turn, this presented me an opportunity to familiarize myself with drug names such as Amlodipine, Gabapentin, Lorazepam, Metformin, and many more. Admittedly, even just seeing and holding the manufacture’s bottle in my hand sparked great interest in myself at that time. I was simply fascinated by the different drugs and found the role of a pharmacist to encompass much more than “dispensing medications.”

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

Initially I was preparing for pharmacy school, but I realized that it was not an active profession and the only way I could work with patients is to distribute prescribed drugs to them. I was young and immature and chose a profession based on financial benefit. After graduating with my bachelor’s degree in biology, I decided to explore the medical field by applying for a volunteer position supporting direct patient care at a hospital.

In high school, there was no clear picture for my future. With an immense grasp in science and math, I knew that was my calling. I wasn't sure of the overall field of study I aspired but I know I wanted to master it and enjoy it for life. My high school teacher referred me to the University of Wisconsin-Madison's Pharmacy School Preview Day. I attended the event my junior year and was washed over in awe. I found a greater appreciation for the use of medicine and the applications

Many years ago when I first decided to pursue a career as a Pharmacy Technician, I always believed that I would be working in a retail pharmacy chain such as CVS or Duane Reade. As a CVS customer, I would see the Pharmacist and Technicians working diligently behind the counter. I told myself I want to do that, I wanted to help people take away their pain and begin the healing process. My career started and I was typing and filling prescriptions for 8 hours with the occasional break to help a customer find something within the store. I never considered working in a hospital Pharmacy because I never experienced what that was like first hand. After working a year at CVS, I was eligible to take the PCTB exam to become a certified Pharmacy technician (CPhT). While studying the material there was another side of Pharmacy that I never knew about. I learned about hospital Pharmacy, it has the same day to day operation that retail does but more. Having a degree in Chemistry from SUNY Stony Brook University, labs were a big part of my education. The idea of a cleanroom and compounding medication excited me; the closest to compounding in retail was reconstituting antibiotic medication for children. This involved measuring and mixing water into a bottle. I left retail and searched for a job that would further advance my pharmacy knowledge. I started working at NYULMC Pharmacy, here I was exposed to information technology that was far more sophisticated compared to retail. As I

When I began my journey through college, I was unsure about where my love and respect for science and healthcare would take me, but I knew that I wanted to take those two interests and apply them with the personal fulfillment I felt when it came to helping others. It was not until I began to have health issues, that I became sound in my decision to pursue the path of pharmacy. Being on the receiving end of treatments, made me have a drastic change in the mindset of how I thought about the healthcare of a patient and how I would apply my science knowledge to my future pursuits. When learning about diseases, illnesses, and deficiencies I would always find myself drifting towards trying to develop a plan of action on what could be given to a person suffering and how a person’s treatment could be optimized.

I originally entered college as an ambitious business major with plans to complete the pre-med track as well. But, I quickly learned that I needed to narrow my focus to one or the other, especially taking on a demanding college baseball schedule involving year round practice and a forty game season. Although I have always been enthusiastic about business, I decided that I didn’t want to pursue a career path that would most likely put my behind a desk crunching numbers or pushing sales all day. It personally seemed to me as something that lacked real meaningfulness and an ability to make a significant impact. Meaningfulness and the ability to apply my love for science was what had always peaked my interest in the medical field. In my sophomore

Over the past few weeks I have been researching my interests, values, and goals. Throughout this research a lot of things that were already evident to me, were proven for a fact. My interests included researching different aspects of science and data analysis. Analysis has always been a big part of my life because I analyze everything. My values have been proven to be centered toward helping people and being around people. These interests and values are almost equivalent with what my goals in life have been over the past years. For the past few years I have wanted to become some type of pharmacist or physician. In this paper, I have researched what being a pharmacist and physician

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.

The career that I am interested in pursuing is a Pharmacists. The number one reason I have decided to become a pharmacist is because I want to help and assist others. The satisfaction of me helping a patient get better quickly is the motivation that drives me. The second reason is the act of working with other health care professionals. Pharmacist have to communicate with other professionals as a team to avoid errors. Communication and connection is a major key in today’s society, in which I like with a passion. The big career dream began when my older cousin sister became the first in the family to graduate from college with a college degree. Her getting a well-paying job and taking care of my aunt and uncle led me to work hard and achieve pharmacy just like her. HCC will help me pursue my goals by helping me get high grades and achieve a high GPA. By me getting an Associates in Science I would then transfer to a big university like University of Houston to continue for higher education.

The flow of the medical community is dependent on every person employed there. The harmony it creates does not only come from the doctors or nurses, but the janitors, surgeons, receptionists, and even the pharmacists. Each job is necessary in order for the hospitals to function properly; for instance, the doctors diagnose the patient with their illness, prescribe them medication to cure it, and send them to the pharmacist, who then gives them their medication and sends them home. However, some jobs are overlooked more than others and do not receive the proper credit, like the pharmacist. Pharmacists are recognized for dispensing and sorting drugs, but their jobs help educate patients over their prescription and uphold the