Medical School vs. Pharmacy School | Which Should I Apply To? 

I've the same dream but I'm confused whether to do pharmacy or medical 😥

That's great to hear! I hope it makes your decision a bit easier! Let me know if you have any questions!

Thank you for watching! Congratulations on your med school acceptance! That's awesome! Thank you for clarifying the difference, that will be very helpful to prospective students!

I'm glad you found my channel too! Don't be nervous, just take it one class at a time. You'll do great!

I'm currently a pharmacy tech but I dont know if I want to go for Pharmacist or Nurse Anesthetist.

Thank you!

Thank you so much for watching! I'm glad you found it helpful!

Thank you for your feedback! I'm so glad it helped!

I'm happy you found my channel too!!! Thank you for watching!!!

Same

ME TOO!

karla which did you pick?

@@mrs4741 the second one, it’s so much better 🤍

@@karlaedith6191 okay.

Mickey Maus hey i am have taking undergrade pre pharmacy as well my 1st 2 year engineering science classes. i am lost if i want to go to engineering school or pharmacy school? any advice about what is good and bad about pharmacy school and being pharmacist? if you have any clue about engineering as well advice.

Tes EXPO visit studentdoctorforum website and look through pre_pharm forums. There is a mix of doom and gloom and people reporting no issues finding jobs after pharmacy school. The pro to pharmacy is 6 figure income. The school can be difficult, but admissions aren't as competitive due to many new schools opening up. That is also a con, because it's difficult to project a 10 year outlook into the profession. I would say that pharmacy is a solid career choice, but the student loan debt will be considerable. I did choose to switch career paths because of the issues I read about in pharmacy. Physicians have loan forgiveness options with rural healthcare and HSPS track, as far as I know, these are not available for pharmacy. Do you enjoy retail? Pharmacy school is only a good choice if you want to be a pharmacist. Expect to have 200K in debt after you are done with school. Pharmacy is less risky because admission standards aren't early as competitive versus medicine, where over 60℅ of applicants never get accepted every year. I know nothing about engineering, sorry. Good Luck!

Hi. I have an associates in electrical engineering and worked for a large engineering firm for about 2 years but currently I am a doctor of pharmacy working at a hospital. I did not pursue a B.S in engineering because i saw how the engineers working at the firm were abused and taken for granted. They were made to work long hours and asked to come on the weekends without additional pay. They were afraid of losing their jobs because there were so many E.E looking for work. Before pharmacy school, I researched the demand for the profession. At the time I entered pharmacy school demand was high and just as high when I graduated. Now it is very different. With additional pharmacy schools opening up the demand has decreased a great deal. It is hard for new grads to find work and only getting harder (started to get saturated at around 2009). So before you commit a very high amount of $$$ and commit to many many years in that profession....I strongly recommend you research the demand for the profession.

+Tes EXPO I would suggest finding out what you are good at. What do you think you can do academically. What are you grades like and can you sit down for long periods of time and study. Would you come home and sit watching TV or do you study away instead. These are all questions you will need to explore. If you set out your stall and make it your life then you could find that your hard work could carry you. Become a jedi of academia and make it your life for the next 4 years and enjoy it while you can because this more than likely will be your only shot at doing this. Once the mortgage comes you will not have the chance.

Retail yes. Big hospitals have a hard time finding good pharmacists.

I'm so glad!

Congratulations! I hope you love it!

Beth Sene of course if you get into Med school then go. I'm a tech and all my pharmacist tell me they only went into pharmacy because it was easier to get into than Med

My grades were high enough to easily get me accepted into both pharmacy and med school, I chose pharmacy anyway (mainly because I didn’t want to spend half my life in school), and after delving into pharmacy I can say for sure that it’s definitely more interesting in my opinion, the knowledge between the two is pretty similar in a lot of areas, but being a pharmacist is first and foremost all about critical thinking and being able to analyze and observe every single detail concerning the actual disease discovery and analysis, the drug design and research, formulation, production and the healing process. It requires extensive knowledge in physics, chemistry, biology and a bit of business as well ( not to mention all the goddamn branching disciplines from them). And for me it was the number one thing I liked about this field, it’s so diverse and it requires an equally diverse set of skills. And it obliged me to think outside the box. I know that being a pharmacist isn’t considered as prestigious as being an MD, but after learning that pharmacists were the ones responsible for the actual curing ( and occasionally saving MDs from making nasty mistakes especially in the clinical pharmacy field), I don’t regret being a pharmacist at all.

I agree

No One not to mention everyone isn’t built for the long haul of medicine. I’m sorry I just can’t see myself in residency in my 30s without having a mental breakdown.

Ngl I'm passionate about med school but because I can't afford medical school I will choose a hard path where I will get pharmacy degree then go to US and apply for medical school. If it works out I will be a doctor at age 27😅😅😅

Honestly, pharmacists who do a residency do not make much if any more money than pharmacists who didn't do one.

They are both great career fields! Pharmacy is definitely a viable career choice; the scope of practice is increasing so much these days that it's opening up lots of new job opportunities!

If that's where you want to work, then don't give up your dream!!! It may just be more difficult/competitive to get a job, whereas in a more rural area you may have 5 offers. Just try to be open minded, in case the city doesn't work out!

Unique Talented Dancers The books don’t help that much. If you took most of the prerequisites, then you should be ready. Try to get practice tests and practice them. That helps a lot. You can get Kaplan. It helps too

moody sefo Same here in Syria 😩

Also lebanese. Not sure what to major in

Dear it's not limited to selling drugs only! It's an independent health professional.

اي عنجد هيك نحن كعرب بسوريا بيقولولنا بياعين او دكنجية 🙂

3a fekra. Im first year pharmacy now in Qatar w bel 3aks it depends in what field you are going for in pharmacy itself. Fi retail fi bl hospital... kello depends on where you wanna work. W hayde lsem3a men wara li byshtghlo bl pharmacies w b bi3o edewye. Im studying pharmacy to become clinical rather than the usual retail job.

I agree with you!

How to become a clinical lab scientist. I am in my 3rd year of chemistry. I am very confused of choosing which field should I go, med or pharm, or grad school doing more chemistry. Please give me advise

@@phuongphan5122 really it all just depends on what you want to do. I highly suggest trying to job shadow both a doctor and a pharmacist(clinical and retail If possible). If you like either of those then go for it. However, say that both a doctor and a pharmacist aren't your thing. Try and get into a research lab at your university. See if you like applying the concepts you learned in class. Try and talk to your advisor in school as well. They can help you in deciding your future based off what your interests are.

I would highly recommend shadowing or volunteering with a pharmacist and with a physician. Pick their brains about the job, the pros and cons of each and try to see yourself in each. I really wouldn't recommend taking both the PCAT and the MCAT for financial reasons and for the added stress of trying to do both. Trust me, I understand it's a difficult decision! Just really try to explore the options of both before you commit!

Just one question.. what is your passion?(As in what do you really like doing?)

+Philip D There are several things you are going to need to do before you make a decisions. First of all are you academically gifted enough to get a place in medical school or Pharmacy school. If you are not academically gifted are you hard working enough that you can put in some serious hours that will take you up that level of grades. And do you have a calling to Medicine, Dentistry or Pharma. And if you meet all of that are you then willing to go to college for 4 years and then go to one of those schools. A typical doctors career is 4 years college, 4 years medical school followed by 4 year residency.

Congrats!!!

ran Hi. It's very normal to find whatever you're studying boring. I always doze off during biochem lectures. So don't freak out. It's extremely normal. Think about why you chose Pharmacy in the first place. The fact that it's boring doesn't mean you should change education. In fact, whatever you change to will also have some boring aspects. I think school is boring in general. I'm sure you'll do great! 🤗🤗🤗

would like to hear if you still think the same way or you changed your mind.

That's a good point! We actually had this discussion in one of my classes. It seems that the overall industry is growing a ton, with all of the new fields within pharmacy you can go into. Also, pharmacists are receiving increasing responsibilities in the health care field (i.e. immunizations) which is increasing demand for pharmacists. Hopefully within the coming years pharmacists will also receive provider status, so that will open up a lot more doors. Good luck on your decision!

If you go on the PharmCAS website, you can go to the school directory and filter by schools that do and do not require the PCAT. You can message me on social media if you want to know my school!

I'm not 100% sure to be honest, but I'm sure that it depends on what department they are working in. I can imagine that if you are working in the emergency department, the hours would be more complicated than an outpatient clinical position.

Alyssa Marie thank you

Elizabeta Mihaj try taking core classes only that relate to math, reading, science, and history. also if they try to force a class onto you that you already know a lot about you can buy credits and just take the test for it.

I think it really depends on the city you're in and what type of job you're looking for. I think if you're looking for a job in a city that has a pharmacy school, your chances of getting a job are lower because you have to compete with many other graduates. If you live in a city that's a bit removed from where schools are located, I think it'll be a bit easier to find openings.

Applies to every field. But if you make it through medical or pharmacy school you will find that it is not as saturated as banking or IT as those fields have a far larger pool of graduates competing.

Thank you for that clarification!

Mickey Maus Why'd you decide to switch from pre-pharmacy to pre-med? I am currently considering the same thing but I am not sure about what to do

Genaro Solorio It's a long story. I had an academic suspensions when I was young, so when I returned to school after leaving the Army, I believed the medical school ship had sailed away. Pharmacy seemed like a far reach so I pursued it hard. At first it was the doom and gloom of pharmacy saturation in major cities that planted that seed of doubt in me. Then it became a matter of wanting the flexibility of choosing a career specialty (primary care/fellowships, psychiatry, emergency medicine, geriatrics, pediatrics, surgery, pathology, OB/gyn, opthomology, PR&M, dermatology, neurology anesthesia, etc) or being able to do research and be a scientist. In pharmacy, it seemed like either retail or hospital job, but as the markets saturated, getting what you want becomes more difficult (sa,e with medicine). With medical school, it sounded like once I got to medical school, I would be exposed to even more things during clinical rotations that might pique my interests and my interests just kept evolving when I made the switch my junior year of undergrad. The money is good, the prestige is there. The ability to became a key player in small rural communities was another draw. I could help out a town where citizens may have medicare, but access to physicians remains in the big cities. Volunteering in the hospitals was very rewarding and I wanted to have a skill later in life that I could donate to benefit others. I met a physician that made a house call to my dying grandmother who was living as a hermit, and reused to seek medical attention for pain medications, even though she was weeks away from dying of horrible cancer. It was very moving and I felt inspired to be like that guy. He also stitched up some illegal that got banged up pretty bad, but refused to go to the hospital for feer of getting deported. I guess I got very into the whole mission of medicine.

Mickey Maus I appreciate your reply and thank you for sharing your story. Good luck in Medical School! I will keep those things in mind and think about it over the summer.

Yes, there are actually a lot of steps that you will have to complete to become a pharmacist in America. Here is a link to an article I found from a woman who moved from the UK to America, and the steps she needed to take to become a pharmacist here. There seems to be a lot of documentation required, as well as taking the NAPLEX and TOEFL to assess English proficiency. Good luck!!! www.pharmaceutical-journal.com/publications/tomorrows-pharmacist/how-to-gain-your-licence-to-practise-as-a-pharmacist-in-the-us/11128041.article

Alyssa Marie thankssss for the information on the link, it has been so helpful for me, thanks a lot, God bless you!

no not a good choice

If you message me on social media I'll tell you what school I go to! My pleasure, thank you for watching!

In your case, if you would choose medical school, do medical school! A B- average is not as bad as you think. Study hard for your PCAT, get some great recommendation letters and write an awesome personal statement, and you are probably good to go! (Just my opinion, I'm not an admissions officer!) Don't settle for another career if you don't truly want to do it, trust me, I've been there!

Okay nice

Plus the 4 years of undergraduate

Definitely depends on your specialty. Physicians have the potential to make a lot more than pharmacists; but, if you're a general practitioner, the incomes can be pretty comparable.

William Fitzgerald hey you should post this in studentdoctor forum

What?

Kinda bad tbh

Complete shit

That definitely depends on what setting you work in. When I was on my hospital rotation, the pharmacists had a TON of say in what meds the doctor would order for the patient!

Alyssa Marie ya I should have added I was talking about community pharmacy

LiMitZplus a patient came to my community pharmacy with two prescriptions for contraindicated drugs for his pregnant wife. If the community pharmacist wasn’t there to warn him and advise the safer alternative, or at least call his physician and advise him to change the medication, their baby would have been in needless risk. Perhaps the authority of a community pharmacist differs from one country to the other?

Pharmacist work in collaboration with physicians. His work is dynamic especially in pharmacovigilance.

@@AlyssaMariePharmacy That pharmacist had a say because that pharmacist was residency-trained, developed a rapport with the healthcare team quickly, or worked in the field for at least 5 years prior. They were not the per-diem pharmacist whose recommendations are usually rejected. Not every pharmacist does clinical pharmacy or wants to do it. Furthermore, there are not that many hospital positions nowadays that do not require a residency.

In the USA, you need your PharmD to be a clinical pharmacist; we actually do not have any masters programs over here that allow you to practice pharmacy. Once you get your PharmD, you would need to pass the NAPLEX exam, and I believe there are a few more steps you would need to do if you are coming from another country. I hope this helps!

I'm pretty sure she did just fine. lol!

I'm glad you learned some things! Thank you for watching and for the constructive criticism!

Michelle Sophia Rios it's a RU-vid video, not a medical Grand round presentation

If it makes you feel better commenting that critic Michelle, I guess we are all very happy for you!!

This is you youtube, not a TedTalk skank. Make your own video so I can criticize you talking. Don't be rude.

If you want to insult another person's field as being inferior intellectually please learn the proper form of "too often", instead of "to often."

thewatcher1950 and what's your specialty?

your comment indicates that you have alow IQ

I'm sure you're very educated, enlighten us.