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Pharmacy Technicians: A Valuable Member of the Pharmacy Team
Do you enjoy a fast-paced environment and have an interest in healthcare - without providing hands-on patient care? A career as a Pharmacy Technician may be for you!
As a Pharmacy Technician, you will assist Pharmacists in meeting patients' medication needs. Your duties may include helping to dispense medications, such as by counting pills, coordinating refills, making IV solutions and preparing single doses for hospitalized patients, as well as maintaining stock, accepting payments, answering phones and performing routine administrative tasks.
"You're definitely part of a team helping people," says Talin Tchakmakjian, Director of American Career College's Los Angeles Campus Pharmacy Technician program, which is also available at the Orange County and Ontario campuses.
In six 20-day modules, American Career College's Pharmacy Technician program exposes students to all aspects of a pharmacy career. It covers pharmacology, which details the different systems of the human body and how medications affect each; chemistry; drug distribution, including how to perform the basic mathematical calculations of pharmacy; and IV admixture procedures, which teaches students how to work in a hospital environment with IV solutions and syringes. The program also provides an overview of procedures at retail outlets, or drugstores, where many students eventually find employment*, and pharmacy law, which outlines the duties a pharmacy technician can legally perform.
A 240-hour externship gives students hands-on experience in the Pharmacy Technician field and is available in different settings to give a variety of experience. Most externships are in retail outlets, but students wishing for hospital-related experience, such as with IVs, may be able to find placements in various medical centers or facilities, says Ms. Tchakmakjian.
"Externships give students practical knowledge and get them used to picking up the phone, helping customers, taking refills and learning the pace and workflow," adds Ms. Tchakmakjian, noting that an externship concludes with a final evaluation by the supervising Pharmacist. "Some of the students do so well in an externship that they are hired by that externship location."*
Pharmacy Technicians must be licensed in the state of California, she notes. Those without a current pharmacy technician license can only work as a pharmacy clerk or assistant.
American Career College is accredited by two national accreditation bodies, the Accrediting Bureau of Health Education Schools (ABHES, www.abhes.org) and the Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges of Technology (ACCSCT, www.accsct.org). The Pharmacy Technician program is programmatically accredited by the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP, www.ashp.org), as well.
Ideal candidates for the Pharmacy Technician program have a propensity for math and science, are detail-oriented and enjoy working as part of a team, says Ms. Tchakmakjian.
Besides pharmacies in retail outlets and in-patient pharmacies in hospitals, graduates may also work in "closed-door" pharmacies, which provide medications to nursing and convalescent homes, or as pharmaceutical sales representatives.
The U.S. Department of Labor expects employment of pharmacy technicians to rise by 32 percent from 2006 to 2016 due to the higher prescription needs of the United States' aging population. In addition, as scientific advances bring treatments for an increasing number of conditions, more pharmacy technicians will be needed to fill a growing number of prescriptions.**
*American Career College cannot guarantee employment. **Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2008-09 Edition, Pharmacy Technicians, on the Internet at http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos252.htm (visited April 29, 2009).
