wavygravy89 Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 -------------- Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
souljaboy Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 Don't think there is an issue when they're deciding to give you the interview or not, but the issue will come up during the interview so you better prepare a good answer to it. It really depends on whether the person looking at your app cares since theres no rules against it at most places. I'm pretty sure the pharmacy people would not like this though, so unless you plan to lie to them it's not likely that you're going to get through the interview if they do interviews. I know a person that has done med after pharmacy, but he graduated from pharmacy school already before getting into med. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bangbangbang Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 With two interviews I would hold up on Pharmacy. If you can get two interviews now, next year (assuming you don't get in this year) you will have even a better resume (perhaps leading to more than two). You have to ultimately decide whether Pharmacy of Medicine is right for you. Keep in mind the job market for pharmacy, pay: Pharm vs meds (85K vs. 200K), as well as other factors. If I were in your situation I would probably stick with meds. If you can get two interviews now, there is a chance you can get them next year as well. Once you are at the interviews in ultimately comes down to your performance. If you can do well, you are in med school. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nosuperman Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 I think the only thing you'd have to worry about is whether they'd accept someone out of the middle of a degree, for example UWO won't. Other than that its prudent to be realistic and follow up on the other interests you might have. Adcoms are very much aware of how hard it is to get into Canadian med schools - they're the ones who turn away so many worthy applicants each year. They can't reasonably expect someone to spend multiple years with all of their eggs in the high-risk basket that is medical ambitions. Also anecdotally, I've met a few med students who had pharm backgrounds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tacrolimus Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 I think the only thing you'd have to worry about is whether they'd accept someone out of the middle of a degree, for example UWO won't. Other than that its prudent to be realistic and follow up on the other interests you might have. Adcoms are very much aware of how hard it is to get into Canadian med schools - they're the ones who turn away so many worthy applicants each year. They can't reasonably expect someone to spend multiple years with all of their eggs in the high-risk basket that is medical ambitions. Also anecdotally, I've met a few med students who had pharm backgrounds. Extremely well put. Also, the interview people at med schools don't have access to even your name, I think. I'm pretty sure a code is used for you, and they have no background knowledge of you. (I heard that from someone, but it does sound a little weird) If that is the case, they won't even know you are in Pharmacy, if you apply after 1st year. The concern should be... the faculty of Pharmacy not appreciating your move, but they can't restrict you from not applying to med. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Savac Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 Extremely well put. Also, the interview people at med schools don't have access to even your name, I think. I'm pretty sure a code is used for you, and they have no background knowledge of you. (I heard that from someone, but it does sound a little weird) If that is the case, they won't even know you are in Pharmacy, if you apply after 1st year. The concern should be... the faculty of Pharmacy not appreciating your move, but they can't restrict you from not applying to med. Some interviews are closed, but other interviews are open. It really depends on the school. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
docmm Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 With two interviews I would hold up on Pharmacy. If you can get two interviews now, next year (assuming you don't get in this year) you will have even a better resume (perhaps leading to more than two). You have to ultimately decide whether Pharmacy of Medicine is right for you. Keep in mind the job market for pharmacy, pay: Pharm vs meds (85K vs. 200K), as well as other factors. If I were in your situation I would probably stick with meds. If you can get two interviews now, there is a chance you can get them next year as well. Once you are at the interviews in ultimately comes down to your performance. If you can do well, you are in med school. Another thing to keep in mind when comparing Pharmacy vs. Medicine is the time you'll spend in school. If you don't get in this year that means 1 year of work (or 2 years of masters) + 4 years of medicine + minimum 2 years (up to 6) in residency + possible fellowship. This means you're looking at earning 200k (usually a bit less as a first year in family medicine...) in about 7-8 years, while with Pharmacy you'll be earning 85K in 4. There is also a significant tuition difference. I'm not swaying you in either direction but like it has already been said...you really need to consider which career best suits your needs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
future_doc Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 If this year, you do not get into Med School but get into Plan B, pharmacy, I would go for it. And next year, at med interview time, if a panel interview, I would be straightforward and honest, telling them your dream has always been med, that last year you were refused and went with your backup to both a) attain knowledge that would help you in medicine and to pursue this profession should you ultimately not get into med upon reapplication. The truth will set you free. One of our members had applied to med unsuccessfully in the past, so this year, he applied to med and to dentistry. He got into dentistry. He also got into med, so you know the path he took. I expect that had he only got into dentistry, he would still be applying for med next year while studying dentistry. We all need to do what we have to in this imperfect world. Good Luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IamIDP Posted February 6, 2013 Report Share Posted February 6, 2013 Another thing to keep in mind when comparing Pharmacy vs. Medicine is the time you'll spend in school. If you don't get in this year that means 1 year of work (or 2 years of masters) + 4 years of medicine + minimum 2 years (up to 6) in residency + possible fellowship. This means you're looking at earning 200k (usually a bit less as a first year in family medicine...) in about 7-8 years, while with Pharmacy you'll be earning 85K in 4. There is also a significant tuition difference. I'm not swaying you in either direction but like it has already been said...you really need to consider which career best suits your needs. 200k per year in family med? I'm thinking closer to 150k depending on where you live. If it's around Toronto, it's likely to be 150k or even less since its so saturated. 200k is realistic if you want to live in low density places or if your lucky to have alot of patience. My point is, each family doc or pharmacist makes different amounts of money. Its variable. Yes there are phamacists that make 500k+, even in the millions if they have enough capital to buy their own shoppers drugmart chains that are successful. Doctors on the other hand don't have much room to expand, they work and make money and its very difficult to increase their income. However, doctors are obviously more stable since the job demand will always be there. Pharmacy also follows but with slightly less demand. But I hope you get my point. Don't listen to people throwing numbers at you, it varies. I know a few family docs making about $130k/year and very few reaching barely 170k. But that means nothing. Just do what you can see yourself doing. You can make $300k/year and live happily until retirement, but what difference does it make if you dont enjoy what you do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
medigeek Posted February 8, 2013 Report Share Posted February 8, 2013 The pharmacy job market is not good and will be 10x worse by the time you're out. Stick to medicine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
medigeek Posted February 9, 2013 Report Share Posted February 9, 2013 Thanks for the response. Hopefully I can strengthen my application in the year if I don't end up getting in this time around. Is the job market for pharmacy a lot worse than medicine? I don't have a desire to live in GTA, not really sure what the job market is like in the rest of Ontario. Maybe I should be practicing for interviews instead of worrying about what will happen if I do poorly in them Become a family doctor and making ~300k/year is veryyy doable where ever you like. Pharmacy... does not working in the gta mean you're okay with the middle of the woods or does it mean you're wanting somewhere like ottawa/kingston/london. Keep in mind the waterloo grads are just hitting the market and the number of international pharmacists is going to double (the number that are taken in and licensed annually). Then keep in mind that logically... you can't have THAT many pharmacies in general. Only so many you can have before the stores arent profiting (just a general idea), so there won't be endless expansion of shoppers/rexall/etc. Last thing to keep in mind, general job outlook. What do pharmacists do? Dispense drugs. Doctors diagnose diseases/perform procedures/do operations. The former can be to some extent done by a machine and already is (drug vending machine at sunnybrook hospital, more on the way!). Long term result is a decrease in employment of staff pharmacists, then throw in saturation factors and things don't look good 20 years from now. You could argue the same and say NPs/PAs + advancing technology can replace primary care... so it seems long term job outlook wise, surgery is safest as you can't ever have robots/machines FULLY performing an operation. Anyway I ranted on a bit, but just things to keep in mind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nosuperman Posted February 9, 2013 Report Share Posted February 9, 2013 Did the pharm students you knew have completed degrees, or did they complete a year and then apply? Completed degrees, for the one's I could confirm at least. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tacrolimus Posted February 9, 2013 Report Share Posted February 9, 2013 Does anyone know of med students that did first year of pharmacy before entering med? Or any pharmacy students know of people who left the class after one or two years to enter med? Yes, I know two or three people. They didn't have a problem getting into med school, but yeah, schools like UWO want you to be completing a degree so you wouldn't qualify for that. The pharmacy job market is not good and will be 10x worse by the time you're out. Stick to medicine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
medigeek Posted February 9, 2013 Report Share Posted February 9, 2013 Finding a job in primary care as a physician is quite easy in toronto/gta. Finding a job as a full time pharmacist is extremely hard here. Floating jobs? sure. Part time? probably. Fast forward 5 years and those will be minimized too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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