Top Stories Baltimore

If you are looking for a fulfilling job, choose the pharmacy technician career, and work alongside of a licensed pharmacist. Almost three-fourths of the pharmacy technicians choose to work in grocery stores, department stores and retail pharmacies.

You may be asking yourself what a pharmacy technician does. They have a variety of jobs they can perform, depending on where they work. An overview of their job is to help a licensed pharmacist provide health care products and medication to patients.

You can help the pharmacist fill prescriptions that doctors have ordered. This may include labeling bottles, counting pills or mixing medicine. You might also do things such as attend the cash register, answer the phone or stock shelves.

Job responsibilities differ somewhat from those above if you work in mail order or retail pharmacies. You would receive the refills or prescriptions that doctors prescribe directly from the patient or from the doctor’s office by electronic means.

Once those prescriptions arrive the technician is responsible for verifying that they are complete and accurate. You would help in the preparation by getting the medicine into the proper bottle, labeling it, adding the price and filing it so it can be found quite easily when the patient comes to get it, or it is ready to be mailed. In these situations you might be needed to fill out insurance claim forms or to help with inventory.

Pharmacy technicians never have to worry about their work environment. It will always be in well lighted, clean and comfortable areas. This job does require you to be on your feet a lot, climb ladders and lift heavy boxes.

Your schedule, as a pharmacy technician, can be quite variable and will mainly depend on the type of establishment you work for. You could be asked to work days, evenings, nights, weekends or holidays. This is especially true if you work in a place that is open 24 hours. As with any job, you will have more control over your hours, the more time you work in a place. There is also part time work available in retail or hospitals.

You don’t have to have any formal training to be a pharmacy technician. You will be trained at your workplace by a licensed pharmacist. Some states or workplaces require you to become certified. If that is necessary, you will need to take a 10 week course to help you prepare for certification.

In order to become a pharmacy technician, you need to enjoy mathematics, be able to follow orders and have a love for people. In the first 10 years, salaries average between $25,000 and $35,000 a year. There are always job openings in the pharmacy technician career.

Want an exciting Pharmacy Technician Career then check out my blog and you will find tips and information on pharmacy technician employment outlook, pharmacy technician duties, and tons of other pharmacy technician training tips.