How to Become a Pharmacist (Pharm D Background Info, Application Process, Pharmacy Careers)

  Intro

With an ever increasing demand for health care, more and more students are considering a career as a pharmacist. Before you make that decision, you should become aware of the requirements and career opportunities available for pharmacists. As a pharmacy school student, I have not only experienced the application process but also researched many aspects of the pharmacy profession.

According to a May 2008 BLS report, there are 266,410 pharmacists in the United States who earn an average of $50.13/hour ($104,620 annually). Salaries vary based on geographical location, employer, and other factors. Many newly registered pharmacists report huge signing bonuses in more rural or in demand areas.

As time passes, pharmacists continue to be given more and more responsibilities within the health care system. Contrary to popular belief, a pharmacist's job does not constitute counting pills from 9 to 5. Only 62% of pharmacists hold traditional community (retail) pharmacy positions (BLS). Other exciting pharmacy careers include positions in a clinical setting (administering drugs as a part of a medical team), a research lab, a government agency (e.g. poison control), a university, a corporation, a nuclear pharmacy (compounding and dispensing of radioactive materials for use in nuclear medicine procedures), and many others. Unlike other medical professional careers, pharmacy has a diverse range of careers available. In addition, most pharmacists do not need any residency experience for most careers (you will need 1-2 years of residency experience to become a clinical pharmacist).

The Increasing Demand for Pharmacists

Pharmacy careers expect a whopping 22% growth in jobs available from 2006 to 2016 (May 2008 report). With the population aging and filled prescriptions increasing, the demand for pharmacists is projected to grow in all pharmacy settings. Although job placement varies based on geographical location, pharmacists will have little trouble finding a job.

Pharm.D. degree

The Doctor of Pharmacy Degree (Pharm.D.) requires a minimum of 2 years of undergraduate coursework (most students receive a bachelor's a degree prior to starting pharmacy school) followed by 3 to 4 years of Pharmacy school. Out of high school, students can apply for Pharmacy schools that have a joint undergraduate and Pharm.D. program which lasts from 5 to 7 years. These programs are also known as "0-6 programs" or "early assurance programs." It is important to note that a Doctor of Pharmacy Degree is different than obtaining a Ph.D. or M.S. in Pharmacy. The Bachelor's degree in Pharmacy has been phased out for the most part, although you may occasionally hear about a registered pharmacist (R.Ph.), who only received a B.S. in pharmacy before the implementation of the Pharm.D. as the norm for pharmacists. I don't know much about online Pharm.D. program, but I am very skeptical about these programs as pharmacy school is very rigorous with many hands on labs, which would be impossible to do online. Pharmacists are technically doctors (Dr.), but many opt to just place the 'Pharm.D.' title after their names.

Undergraduate Majors

There is no requirement or restriction on undergraduate majors for pharmacy school. Many students choose to pursue Biological Sciences and Chemistry majors as many of the pharmacy prerequisites are requirements for those majors. Other students pursue a wide variety of majors (business, art, psychology, economics, engineering, etc.) before beginning their pharmacy careers. In the end, successful completion of prerequisites is what really matters; however, choosing a biology or chemistry (or similar major) may give you a stronger science background to prepare you for the material presented to you in pharmacy school.

PharmCAS

PharmCAS (Pharmacy College Application Service) is the "centralized application service for applicants." Although a majority of the pharmacy schools use this service, there are a few pharmacy schools that choose not to use PharmCAS. Students use PharmCAS to submit Letter of Recommendations (done either online or by paper), transcripts, a personal statement, and additional application information. This service is not free, and you will need to pay $140 for first pharmacy school and $40 for each pharmacy school after that. It is important to note that some pharmacy schools require you to send in some of the application material DIRECTLY to them in addition to sending it to PharmCAS.

Supplemental Application

Many schools also require a supplemental application and an additional fee in addition to the PharmCAS application. The supplemental application usually contains essays which gives a clearer picture of the candidate and his or her fit with a pharmacy school. PharmCAS has a pharmacy school information page, which lists all of the pharmacy schools and their specific application requirements.

Interview

Every pharmacy school requires the infamous interview process to judge your fit for their program. Although the weight placed on the interview varies from school to school, one's performance at an interview is a significant factor to receive admission to pharmacy schools.

Prerequisites

Prerequisites vary greatly from school to school. You can also find browse the school list supplied by PharmCAS to get more information on the perquisites. You may apply for pharmacy programs before completing all of your prerequisites https://www.sourcing-force.com/, but you must complete them before matriculation. For exact course equivalencies (exact course numbers from your institution), check to see if the school you are applying for has a webpage that allows you to check to see the exact course numbers from different schools. I know that USC and UOP have this available for students. UCSF and UCSD has their course equivalencies listed on Assist.org.

Prerequisites can be taken at your primary institution or at a community college. If you already have a bachelor's degree, it is more economical to attend a community college to knock out all your prerequisites. If you are currently enrolled as an undergraduate at a university, it is generally okay to take a few prerequisites at a junior college; however, you do not want to make it seem as if you are dodging all the difficult course requirements.

PCAT

The PCAT is the "Pharmacy College Admissions Test." Not all pharmacy schools require the PCAT (14 pharmacy schools that use PharmCAS do not require it, my other article lists these schools). The material covered on the PCAT as described from the AACP website: The PCAT is divided into separate sections, or subtests, each of which is timed separately. During the time allowed for each subtest, you will be permitted to work only on that section. You will not be allowed to go back to earlier subtests or on to later ones. As you work on each section, you may find it useful to first answer the questions that are easy for you, skipping over those questions to which you will need to return for further thought. There are six content areas measured by the PCAT in seven (7) separate subtests:

o The Verbal Ability section

o The Biology section

o The Reading Comprehension section

o The Quantitative Ability section

o The Chemistry section

o The written essays (2)

GPA

Your GPA (overall and science) is the most important aspect of your application profile. Each school has different standards when it comes to GPA, and by browsing the PharmCAS pharmacy schools page you can get an idea of what different pharmacy schools expect. Remember that an average GPA means that students with GPAs under and above that value are accepted. Schools may vary on how they consider scoring classes that you retake, so you should get in contact with pharmacy school admission offices to get more information.

Letter of Recommendations

One to four letters of recommendations are required in the application process for pharmacy schools. Schools differ on who they accept letters of recommendations from, so it is important to know what is acceptable by looking at the school profile pages on PharmCAS. Generally speaking, receiving letters of reference from pharmacists and science professors who know your ability and potential on a personal level will be the most beneficial.

Financing Pharmacy School

Like other professional degrees, financing your way to a Pharm.D. is significantly more costly than undergraduate programs. Government grants that you may have received for your undergraduate program are usually no longer available, so paying for your tuition will primarily depend on student loans. Make sure you apply for FAFSA before their deadline, so that you are considered for some of the government loans. It is also a good idea to apply for national, school, corporate, online, and local scholarships. Any money that you can get for free to pay down your tuition will mean less money you will be paying on interest for the life of the loan. Even a $1000 scholarship will decrease your loan amount by $1000 along with all the interest you would have paid during the life of the loan. I will provide a list of scholarships that are available in the near future.

Post GSA Contract Award - 3 Mistakes Vendors Make

The task of managing your GSA contract can prove to be quite difficult especially if you have a supply contract with a large list of line items. Contractors unknowingly make mistakes that eventually become costly to your business. If you don't understand the process of managing the contract once it is awarded it is best to hire a reputable consultant that can assist. If you decide to go at it on your own it is smart to read and understand what you are agreeing to before you sign on the dotted line or again, at least have a representative that can interpret what your responsibilities will be.

A small mistake could turn into a big deal if you don't understand what is required of you, so follow what I call GSA's golden rule in order to prevent facing future problems. Many times mistakes are found during the audit process and if there isn't a sufficient reason why the mistake was made you could face penalties or possibly lose your contract altogether. Penalties can incur from the time the mistake occurred up to the moment the mistake was noticed and that my friend is costly. Here are some common mistakes made by contractors post award that could possibly assist you.

Not properly documenting sales items- Contractors often do not have an internal system that separates GSA Schedule line items from Open Market line items. One of your duties as a contractor is to report your GSA Schedule sales quarterly https://smart-contract.com/, this means report all sales made under the scope of your GSA contract using the particular SIN within the contract. In order to maintain that properly it is best that you document your invoices accordingly if the item is Open Market that needs to be visible. If it is not visible to you then it is not visible to the Audit Officer and that can cause problems. Contract audits take place two times during the tenure of the contract. The first audit is within the first two years and the last takes place between the fourth and fifth year of the contract.

Offering discounts not applicable to the contract- If you have agreed to a particular price in your contract with the agency it is best that you apply that price to future customers in order to keep it simple. Hopefully during the negotiations you agreed to a price that is sufficient to market trends and a price that helps your business grow. Applying additional discounts and not notifying the agency won't be pretty so do your market research before you get to this point in order to avoid any headaches.

Proper sales reporting- Not reporting your industrial funding fees or paying the fees on time can be an issue. After award of your contract the agency requires that the contractor report and pay any fees due every three months (quarterly), the fixed rate fee is 0.75% of all sales. If there are no sales for that quarter then you have no concerns, but you still have the responsibility to report 0 for the sales incurred. Sometimes this is a problem for vendors who get busy with the day to day activities and simply forget to report. That can become a problem and your business could incur more fees for not reporting or paying fees owed. So please report on time.

Even with the emergence of mobile, web applications continue to be popular and in demand among businesses locally or abroad. The applications may be a software or web-based tool and both play critical roles in the business world. The ability to provide seamless link between different channels of communication and interaction to the business environment and outside, web application development becomes a necessity.

To be or not to be, outsourcing the development of web-based applications can provide powerful benefits and advantages to businesses. But before delving deep into this subject matter, it is important to understand who exactly requires these application developments. Smartly using applications can provide beneficial returns to the performance of B2B and B2C sites. For the past decades or so, Filipino web application development experts are highly in demand for providing high-quality working opportunities and an adequate amount of money generation.

So why outsource the development web application solutions? The global growth in competition and demand for even more advanced technologies are becoming more and more intense. Companies who want to be competitive and shine in their market are racing to meet current trends to satisfy their customer base. And in their bid to keep up with the evolving market conditions, outsourcing their web application development can offer tremendous help. Among other reasons, outsourcing would allow the company to -

Focus on new strategies and products. As market demands change, there is little time left to implement new strategies to play catch up. Engaging in development tasks can be a little demanding of time and resources that what they could otherwise use to invest to improve their competitive edge might lag behind. If outsourced to a service provider, companies can now focus on the business liabilities. There is also access to expertise that they lack internally, hence maximising their investments in outsourcing web application development projects.

Reduce Cost. Outsourcing is sought after by companies due to the savings in time and cost that it can give. The process of producing new application software or web application can be costly if done in-house. There is also the issue of setting up an internal development department that could be both challenging and all too consuming of money, time and other available resources. Outsourcing the project or work to a vendor not only allows your company to produce the product quickly to the market, you are also liberated from attending to the complexities of setting up a new department, namely hiring space, employment and training costs, among other expenses.

Access to Best Resources. Competition is tough in the outsourcing domain that in order to retain clients and ensure long-term contracts with a customer, third party outsourcing firm recruit and acquire the best talents with adequate expertise and experience to meet the demanding business and technological challenges. If you are only starting to build your in-house web application development talent force, you might already be too late if you need to meet demands in the market quickly.

Other value-added benefits of outsourcing include increased productivity and having a dedicated team of resources. For the former, outsourcing will allow you to concentrate on more important functions of your business. When you divide your available time and resources to implement and perform all core and non-core functions of your business, you will soon realise you are already spending a lot of these intangible resources to non-performing business benefits.

With a dedicated team who will work for your projects that outsourcing allows, the risk attached to the development and management of application development has been reduced. It is the outsourcing partner who becomes accountable and responsible to meet the timely delivery of the service.

So even with these few benefits and back to our question. The immediate and resounding answer is yes! Outsourcing your web application development project or business to a third party do make sense in this hyper-competitive business environment.

Cullet, The Recycling of Glass

Cullet

Waste glass is called cullet. The word cullet comes from the art of glass blowing. Every time a blown item is separated from the blowing pipe there remains some glass at the blowing pipe and also the connecting part at the blown item has to be removed afterwards. The last is also called the little neck of the blow piece or collet. These two pieces of glass, the collet and the blow pipe left-over are going back into the glass oven, they are recycled. The word cullet is probably derived from collet.

Some of the waste glass is collected. After collecting all the glass products are crushed and this crushed glass bears the name cullet. There is no typical size for the broken pieces of glass to be called cullet. Broken windows, broken bottles, broken glassware for instance, belong all to the category cullet.

There are companies which are specialized in selling cullet and offer a wide range of different colors and glass types.

Reusing waste glass is good for the environment

The main purpose to collect broken glass is recycling. Glass is an ideal material for recycling. Broken glass can be heated up in the glass oven and from the glass melt new items can be made, over and over again and virtually nothing is lost.

Every metric ton or 1,000 kg of cullet recycled, saves 315 kilograms of carbon dioxide from being released into the atmosphere during the creation of new glass.

For the production of glass, from the raw materials soda ash, limestone and sand, every 1000 kilograms of cullet used replaces 1.,200 kilograms of the raw materials.

By adding 10% of cullet to the melting glass batch instead of the raw materials, 2.5% of energy is saved.

Since glass makes up a large part of household and industrial waste, due to its weight and density, collecting glass waste reduces the volume of waste sent to landfill.

In layman's terms: Recycling of glass is good for the environment (less carbon dioxide output, reducing volume of waste landfill), it safes natural resources (less raw materials necessary, less fuel for melting necessary) and it safes costs (lower energy costs).

Collection of waste glass

Most people around the world are used to the recycling of glass. Already forty years glass containers can be found in many municipalities or there is some sort of organisation around the collection of waste glass.

At the collection points usually clear glass is separated from the green and the amber glass. Otherwise the glass is separated afterwards at a cullet company.

This separation of colors is very important. Glass of different colors have usually a different chemical nature and this influences things like melting temperatureand viscosity. Another problem is the color because clear glass will be slightly colored if only a little green, amber or blue glass is mixed in the used cullet.

The household waste glass is mostly packaging glass, which is all made of the normal soda-lime glass. Heat-resistant glass has a totally different chemical nature. If only a little bit heat-resistant glass is present in cullet then it has a big effect on the viscosity during the melting process and this has to be avoided. That's why heat-resistant glass may not be thrown into a waste glass container.

Metal caps and plastic parts can usually be separated by the waste glass processor. However every non-glass part that slips to the separation process https://www.honeybong.com/ , like the Tungsten wires from the good old light bulb, can give rise to inclusions which make the new glass not only less beautiful but it also makes the glass less strong (locally) and this can be a safety issue.

Products made out of cullet

Because it is a bulk industry, the highest value product that is made of recycled glass are new glass packaging materials (and also household glassware). Another high-value end product is fiberglass which can be used for insulation materials or in composite materials. The cullet used for glass packaging and fiberglass needs to be color separated and free from any foreign material.

Cullet that doesn't meet these specifications can be found in many other "secondary" applications like glass countertops, tiles, abrasive products and filtration products.

Much research has been done to mix the glass cullet with concrete for which the cullet doesn't need to have high specifications. The concrete made in this way is stronger and has a higher insulation capacity than concrete without cullet. The cullet used for concrete is called glass aggregates and is a mixture of cullet with different colors.

These glass aggregates are also increasingly used, as a replacement for gravel or crushed rock, for pipe bedding for sewer pipes and drinking water pipes.

Many glassware factories make use of cullet for their products. For high-end glassware this is usually up to 10% because the clarity of the glass can be affected by using more cullet.

Some glassware companies make full use of cullet and use only cullet for the production of their glassware. If only cullet is used to make a new glass batch, the glass is not as homogeneous as it is made with the usual raw materials. This results in an end product with some local flaws and more air bubbles. Some glassware manufacturers make use of the imperfections of this "cullet-glass", because the products can look antique and more nostalgic. A good example is the company Guajuye in Mexico which makes beautiful glassware from this type of glass.

People improvise all the time and there are artists and even companies who use waste glass before it is crushed. Good examples are the Green Glass Company and the French artist Laurence Brabant. They use old bottles and make all kind of decorative products, but also useful products out of it.

Separating glass and bringing it to the waste glass container is a common thing nowadays. By doing that you help reducing the pressure on the environment and natural resources. In the meantime you also help companies reducing their costs and you create possibilities for other people to start a new business.