There are certain job duties that come to mind when someone mentions a specific profession. When you say pharmacy technician, people might think of responsibilities such as bottling medication and distributing medication to customers. However, there are certain job duties that may not immediately come to mind when you think about pharmacy technicians. We are here to shed some light on the less well-known job duties for this career. Learn more about this below.
Things You May Not Know About Working as a Pharmacy Technician
Every job has duties, responsibilities, and tasks that you may not know a lot about. Check out some of the secrets involved with working as a pharmacy technician. This job has a lot more to it than many people might think.
- You May Find Doctor Errors – As a pharmacy technician, you will be working under a pharmacist, but you still might find places where doctors made errors. Doctors are human too, and they can make mistakes and sometimes those mistakes can find their way onto a prescription. However, between the pharmacist and the pharmacy technician, those errors can be caught and corrected. In fact, an important part of a pharmacy technician’s job is to be in communication with doctors and nurses to double check prescriptions and correct any errors. This is very crucial work because a mistake on a prescription could lead to health problems or complications.
- It’s a Fast-Paced Environment – You might not think of a pharmacy as a fast-paced and hectic environment, but it definitely can be. This type of environment can be very demanding because there can be a lot going on at once. A pharmacy tech has a lot of different job duties including calling doctors, billing insurance, serving customers, and so much more. When there is a long line of customers, you will be expected to handle your tasks quickly to get the customers through the line as efficiently as possible while still giving them excellent customer service. It can be challenging at times to keep up with the busyness especially when you have customers that are impatient, but it is all part of your job as a pharmacy technician.
- You Can Work in a Hospital – You may think of pharmacy technicians as working in retail. You think of them in drug stores or the pharmacy section of a grocery store, but that is not the only place that pharmacy technicians work. Pharmacy technicians can also work in hospitals so that they can work with patients to find them the medications that they need. The Bureau of Labor Statistics tells us that about 16 percent of pharmacy techs work in hospitals, so it is a pretty substantial amount.
- Pharmacy Techs Have Many Job Duties – You might think of a pharmacy technician as someone who just hands out pills to customers waiting in line, but there is a lot more to the job than just that. Yes, pharmacy technicians distribute medication, but they also check prescriptions, label medications, and bottle medications. They also bill insurance companies, talk to doctors, organize inventory, restock medication, and so much more. There are so many little job duties that pharmacy technicians have, which can make it a demanding job at times, but it is also very rewarding to be able to help people get the medication they need to improve their health.
Now that you know some secrets about working as a pharmacy technician, you might want to look into pharmacy tech school. Pharmacy tech school could give you the training and experience you need to learn all of the other pharmacy technician secrets. Learn more below.
Taking on Pharmacy Tech School
Above, we discussed some secrets to being a pharmacy technician. One of those was that pharmacy technicians might find doctor errors with prescriptions. Your pharmacy tech school can prepare you to find those errors with the classes you will take. For example, in a pharmacy technician school, you will take classes that teach you about pharmacology and pharmacy calculations. These types of courses will teach you how specific drugs interact with the body, and how to determine the correct dosage of a specific medication for a patient. This knowledge will be extremely beneficial when you are performing job duties like labeling and bottling prescriptions.
FVI School of Nursing and Technology has a pharmacy technician program that you can attend. This program is just nine months long, so it could prepare you for a career in the medical industry very quickly. Click here if you would like to learn more about the pharmacy tech program at FVI.
For more information about graduation rates, the median debt of students who completed the program, and other important information, please visit our website:
https://fvi.edu/consumer-information/
