On November 26, 2013, I had the pleasure of shadowing Mrs. Jackie Becks, a registered pharmacist at CVS Pharmacy in Bellevue, Ohio. The six hours of shadowing seemed to go by very quickly and was very enjoyable. Mrs. Becks graduated from the Ohio State University’s College of Pharmacy. She has been in the profession for at least two decades.
I observed Mrs. Becks as she verified each prescription that the pharmacy technicians filled. She showed me the system that CVS uses with the bar codes. It was very different from when I shadowed at CVS about four years ago as a freshman in high school. Mrs. Becks told me that when a certain queue had so many listings in it, there would be an orange circle around it. This happened a few times, but that day was a particularly busy day in the pharmacy. I never really expected there to be that many prescriptions going through a pharmacy in my small hometown.
Mrs. Becks also administered several influenza vaccinations to patients. She told me that once you have been giving vaccines long enough that it is very simple, but did not like it at first. I would have thought it did not take a lot for a pharmacist to give flu vaccines, but sometimes it interrupts the flow of work they had been doing prior to that. In a community pharmacy, there is one pharmacist on duty with generally three or four technicians, which allows the technicians to keep working while the pharmacist gives the vaccines.
While the technicians have access to most of the pharmaceuticals, they do not have access to the narcotics. Mrs. Becks had to count and fill those prescriptions herself. She has to be careful that she grabs the correct prescription because certain prescriptions have very similar National Drug Codes (NDCs). Mrs. ...
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... of the groups discussed two weeks ago. My experiences with community pharmacy was always just picking up prescriptions and seeing the pharmacist behind the counter. I never realized how stressful and potentially chaotic community pharmacy is at times.
Professionalism in community pharmacy is necessary to have. The pharmacist dresses professionally, which looks better and helps some people trust you more. Even though there are some patients that are very rude and impatient, the pharmacist must control himself or herself to communicate effectively. Even though there were stressful times during the workday for Mrs. Becks, she remained professional while doing her job. This shadowing experience was a great experience to have. I was able to learn a lot about the profession of pharmacy in the community setting along with make connections to what I am learning in class.
According to Kasie, the most difficult part about her job was learning her way around the hospital and remembering where every med room was located. This is Kasie’s first hospital pharmacy tech job, she loves it! Her inspiration was that she has always been fascinated with medications and how they work, she is also amazed by the human body and science. She is a certified technician, because, where she is working she is required to be certified as well as registered, and it looks better on a resumé. She works at Baptist Health Jacksonville in Jacksonville,
Since I have been worked in Veteran Affairs Medical Center in Baltimore, Maryland, I was not surprised with the work load and the hospital setting at Millcreek Community Hospital (MCH). With a goal of enrichment my knowledge in a hospital pharmacy setting, I am enthusiastic in accomplishing the assigned duties. I have very high expectation during these four weeks of IPPE rotation; I expect to learn beyond what I already know in the past and apply what I learn during the past year in to pharmacy practice. Arriving at Millcreek Community Hospital, I was not surprised the pharmacy's setting in hospital but I'm surprised the different types of work I received. At Veteran Affairs Medical Center, all I ever did are filling the prescriptions, stocking, and managed automated machines but at MCH,
Dr. Barbee came to work in slacks and tie every day. The reason I know this is because the fourth year student told me that he was required to wear the same. Some of the technicians and pharmacist had on scrubs and crocs. This was not a representation of professionalism, but Dr. Barbee made sure to carry himself professionally. He was a very calm and soft spoken individual, he was polite and very respectable. “The key to quality and efficiency is professionalism.” He showed all the qualities of being professional and was a great role model to us. Also Dr. Barbee was asking me some questions about Diabetes. I knew the answer to most of the questions but some I did not know, so I looked them up on the search engines he provided. I learned some new things that helped me later in my pathophysiology and physiological chemistry class on the topic of Diabetes. Diversity is a key aspect of the hospital because they serve all individuals. From infants to elderly, to disabled to
The earliest glimpse of my future was at an elementary career day years ago. When I filled out what I was going to dress up as I wrote the word, “farmacist.” My mom was a pharmacist and I looked up to her and wanted to be just like her! So when career day rolled around I dressed in a white coat carrying a big bottle full of M&M’s to dispense to my classmates. Now so many years later here I am actually about to take on graduate school and follow in my mother’s footsteps to become a pharmacist. Of course my career path has been less than a straight line from “farmasist” to pharmacist. My passion and talent for math and science in high school allowed me to seriously consider a career in engineering. However, the more I considered engineering, the more there seemed to be something missing. As much as I loved solving problems I did not see
This introduced a different side of the pharmacy field where a strong interaction with the public is substantial. As a pharmacy techician, I worked to support pharmacists in greeting patients with prescription orders, processing insurance paperwork, and answering questions and requests. I learned to be patient and resourceful, but constrained in my ability to give medical advice as often times patients ask for advice. Also, this job allowed me the opportunity to learn from pharmacists as they prepare prescriptions, provide advices to doctors and help patients with the most cost effective medications. Nonetheless, the most rewarding aspect of this job has been my ability to assist patients and conversing with them on personal level, ranging from trivial topics like how their days go or casual chats about the recent daily events, to their history of medical troubles. This job has definitely provided me with the real-world experience needed to be successful in the pharmacy field and improved my customer service
The pharmacist was very friendly because he would listen to every bit of information given by the customers. In pharmacy field, it is important to be organized at job area, since there is lot of medications you have to deal with. If the pharmacist its not responsible for his work, then he will accidentally messed up and will give the medicines it to the wrong person. Keeping this in mind, I observe the pharmacist at shadowing station and he was perfect at his job. He check the label on the medicines twice before giving out to the customers to make sure his giving it to the right person. Watching this I was surprised because I learn that, whenever you do something, check and ask yourself “whatever I am doing, is it right ? .” Next, I learn how important is to keep good relationships with the people your working with. At shadowing station, the pharmacy technician was great supporter to the pharmacist because pharmacy technician manage the area of dosages, labeling, and medication dispensing. Mainly observing the pharmacist I feel that they care about the patients because when I saw the patients facial expressions, the patients felt trustworthy on the pharmacist.
It is this singular fact that very few people realize. A pharmacy technician who receives no formal training is responsible for not just the delivery of a patient’s medication, but also for their bill, their confidential information, and their life. The question now is, how can an uneducated individual be given so much responsibility? Technicians are granted these responsibilities because a pharmacist can not do the job alone. Pharmacists strive to mold each new technician into an employee that will realize what technicians really do.
Giving out the wrong medication, or improper dosages can potentially be fatal to patients. Pharmacy technicians must be willing to take on this risk and do their work as carefully and accurately as possible.
Influenza is a very serious disease that can lead to hospitalization and even fatalities. There are many different strands, infecting people of all ages and originating from different animals, which can be extremely fatal if the right care isn’t provided. Care for flu patients have changes tremendously over the years from once having no vaccine to having a limited amount of vaccines, only for the most prone individuals, to now having yearly vaccines to prevent the most common cases of flu. Doctors have learned just how deadly the flu virus can be which has led to the importance of them educating their patients of the flu virus and explaining the importance of getting the vaccine in order for their bodies to get an immunity of the many flu viruses that many in our country have previously faced. Many in our county in the past have died from the H1N1 virus due to no vaccines, poor precautions, and being uneducated on the virus because it was new, but new vaccines and precautions are being taken in order to prevent pandemics such as the Flu Pandemic of 1918.
Pharmacists have a very tedious job because it requires a lot of attention to detail. Pharmacists dispense drugs and provide information to the patients about medication. Not only do they provide information to patients about side effects, but also they inform physicians of the ever-changing selection of drugs and dosage. Weighing, measuring, mixing drugs, finding the identity and purity, and strength of medications is also an important part of the job. Pharmacists must be sure not to dispense drugs that will have a negative reaction to the other medications that the patient may already be taking. Pharmacists work in clean, well-lighted, and well-ventilated areas. They work with dangerous materials and sterile pharmaceutical products, which require them to wear gloves and masks. Many full time, salaried pharmacists work at least about forty hours per week. Community pharmacists research and dispense information and help for diabetes, asthma, smoking cessation, and high blood pressure....
The importance of the becoming a pharmacist should not be about what the career can give a person in monetary value or the amount of accolades one receives. Instead, the career should be about saving and improving human lives and serving the public. Pharmacists keep people healthy, make them feel better, and try to help the public live longer and happier lives as long as possible. From small infant children to the elderly, everyone needs pharmaceutical care. Sometimes it can be a matter of life and death if medication is not available to the public. Pharmacy as a career would be a wise decision if a person could withstand the amount of education the profession entails.
I pleased to apply to the PharmD program as the program is one area that corresponds to my career dreams. Being part of this program gives one the opportunity to gain an excellent experience in working and collaborating with various health care providers in the ward. But more importantly, it facilitates a practical environment in dealing more closely with patients. Hence, it helps to provide the ultimate health care services to patients. Also, it permits me to carry on gaining different knowledge, skills, and values in addition to those I have already developed during my undergraduate studies. My interest in being a clinical pharmacist was first aroused during my SPEP rotation in the hospital setting where I was really impressed with the role of clinical pharmacists who provide a consistent process of patient care with healthcare teams to maintain the appropriateness, effectiveness and safety of the medication use. Unlike a pharmacist, a clinical pharmacist has a more diversified responsibilities and closeness to direct patient care. Moreover, provides
As far as I am concerned, the pharmacist is also very much concerned with people’s welfare, and is committed to improve people’s lives through the knowledge of medicine and patient care. I cherish the thought of being able to make a difference in the real world. I enjoy helping people, and I am looking forward to play a responsible and beneficial role in the community.
I was also responsible for monitoring medication orders and reviewing patient profiles to ensure that the proper drugs and dosages were prescribed and that the pharmacy technician had prepared them properly. In many instances there were mistakes made in the preparation phase and sometimes even before, with incorrect dosages or drugs being prescribed and prepared, which could result in serious adverse effects for the patient. A clinical pharmacist’s role, however, is to make sure that these mistakes never reach the
Will, L. ed., 2010. Technology and the Future of Pharmacy: A Roundtable Discussion. Computer Talk for the Pharmacist, [online] 30(3), 20-36. Available at: [Accessed on 11 November 2011]