Re: How to RPh who read/polled US Pharmacist feel/think about technicians?

[Guest guest]

Doesn't shock me.

Check out http://www.theangrypharmacist.com/

Take a blood pressure pill/Xanax before reading

Scroll to " The Truth About California Pharm Tech Licenses. " Look for December

2nd.

Now TAP says stuff just to stir things up. But the part which is eye opening is

the comment section. I have found most of it to be true.

1) Most places around here will not do school externships PERIOD.

2) Techs with trade school certificate are next to unhirable..

3)Give a tech some education and they think they can run the store.

The guy writing the blog is there to stir up mischief, but the comment section

is most of the attitude I have come across looking for a job here in Michigan.

(Retail, never received a hospital interview yet)

I watered down my resume to just include that I finished the Penn

program. Didn't include I have my PTCB. That was enough to get a position at an

independent retail.

Not a very nice picture out there.

Nan

Michigan

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

[Guest guest]

Dear All who have read or care to read the link provided before this post by

lilbatz:

My personal perspective on no education/no cerification vs no

education/cerification vs education/training/certification is as a pharmacy

teacher, as well as a technician:

When I first became a tech in CA I was an educated, trained externed tech. When

I was hired I worked with old school techs who had been trained on the job 10 to

20 years earlier. They were in fear the educated tech would one up them. The

truth is I caught more drug dupication errors, drug interactions, allergies etc

than any of them. BUT they out shined me on the making of IV's, filling

cassettes speed of getting drugs off the shelves etc because they had more

experienced. However I had to keep reminding them that their aseptic technique

sucked.

With time I gained experience, and I proved that training a tech who

went to an accredited pharm tech program that had an externship component was

far better than training someone off the street from scratch. In those days

there were no certified techs.

Today as an educator I have proven to many directors the same and then some! I

have proven that hiring/training a graduate of an accredited pharm tech program

with an externship, registration and certification is far better than hiring

someone who used the self-study method who has registration and cerification,

but no hands on experience.

As an educator I make sure my lab practicals are as true to real life as

possible and include medication safety, medication drug interactions, allergy

scenarios etc and med reconciliation. I make it reflect real life. Most of the

labs are hospital based and most of the externships are at hospitals.

My students are taught MOA and pharmacology, so that they can BETTER catch

medication errors.

Externship is to put into practice what they have learned via didactic lecture

AND mock labs, to be monitored and further trained on the job in real time real

life setting BEFORE they are deemed licensed/registered. It is PART of the

educational process and TUITION! To extern at the hospital one must be insured

and this is part of the 'deal' that is made with the hospitals. The student gets

experience and the hospital gives back to community and the hospital may or may

not hire the tech, but trains them without having to hire or pay them. It is a

win win situation.

Currently hiring of techs is down all across the country as is any type of work

due to the economy. But if one goes back to school clearly the BEST " place to

be " , the best subject to study is some type of health care. Being ready for the

future, future job openings is your 'tomorrow'.

Schools do not have to charge 15K and up to be effective and to teach all that

is necessary and encompassing as they should be. Cmmunity college tech programs

are less expensive, but may take longer. Private voc schools in CA range from

$500 to $2500 with an AA or AS.

In 2004/2005 with the change in CA state law, I predicted the flood of

non-educated non-trained CPhT's in the state of CA would cause people to say

that they could not get hired and it would cause people not to want to go to

pharm tech school. I predicted it would cause pharmacists to want to hire

educated/trained PhT's or CPhT's rather than CPhT's who studied out of a book

only. THIS is my REALITY now! My prediction has come true in the area in which

I live and work. My students get educated, trained in labs, further experienced

with externships, get Registered/licensed and must become a CPhT. In this way

they are ready with the qualifications for the job openings that the pharmacists

in the Long Beach and LA area are demanding and will continue to demand in the

future.

These pharmacists do not want someone who studied out of a book, passed the

certification exam only, without any hands on experience. Being registered in

the state of CA does not 'state' how one got certified. So only an interview or

knowledge of training that person your self as an extern will answer that

question. YET the pharmacists still want the applicant to be a CPhT: they want

the whole package.

So I beg to differ with TAP's opinion and his or her experience. It may be

his/her opinion and experience, but it is not mine! NOT one of the hospital

pharmacy directors of the Kaiser's, Independant and County hospitals in a 25

mile radius of the school where I teach would prefer an uneducated person to

train, or a person who studied a book only who passed the PTCB to train OVER an

educated/trained/externed technician from the school that I teach. Proof is in

the pudding.

Some of the hospital directors that I refer to above have commented on the

quality of education of the various schools and what they get as externs. Most

of what they comment on teachers and schools have NO control over. They comment

on poor attendance and being tardies IF this occurs. This is rare, has happened

upon occasion. But what they do comment on is more about the suttle differences

in the preparedness of the students for externhip among various schools.

Inevitably I will have at least 6 students a year or so tell me that they were

told by the tech trainer or the director (after trying themselves) to TEACH

another extern from another school how to do an aligation, simple math,

ratio/proportions etc. or how to set up TPN's by gravity method, how to

reconstitute etc.

On one of my interviews for a position teaching I asked to see the

'self-contained' classroom. I was told they had an IV hood.

I was in shock when I saw that the small hood was being used as a book rack for

reference books, the books had dust on them, no one knew where the needles and

syringes were. Clearly no practice IV labs had taken place in the hood OR

classroom for a LONG, LONG time. In fact no one seemed to know what types of

labs were being done at all.

So while schools are not created the equal and neither are educators,

technicians and pharmacists, STANDARDIZATON of education for pharmacy

technicians would allieviate some of the confusion as to why people off the

street, with self-study no experience no formal education certified pharm techs

and formally educated, trained/externed certified pharmacy technicians all

perform differently upon hire.

Education is the BEST tool for prevention of medication errors and stands

between Life and Death of a patient. JUST ASK the Ohio technician who made an IV

for little and asked/begged the pharmacist to take a look at the order.

Had she been my student she would have KNOWN that 23.4% NaCL STRAIGHT undiluted

would KILL the patient BECAUSE she would have been taught. She would have

understand isotonicity. Sadly Little died, thus the Ohio Law. More

sadly Ohio STILL does not require education for pharmacy technicians. The only

requirement is certification.

TAP will not, nor ever agree with me. I don't expect that. I ask HOW many more

's due to lack of tech education and knowledge? But I am entitled to my

opinion.

Since I could not/would not censor you, " lilbatz " , I posted your comment to my

site as a response to my previous posting of what some pharmacists think about

certified pharmacy technicians.

HIndsight: perhaps I should not have posted the results of the survey of the

opinions of pharmacists on this site.

THIS is a study site and not a site for such discussion or debate about School

or not to school, whether or not there are jobs out there for CPhT's who have

not gone to school, whether TAP or myself is correct, the merit of debate, the

art and skill of debate, am I wasting my time studying to be CPhT, etc etc.

FAIR WARNING!

That being said let it be known that if you/any one reading this post plan to

comment on your opinion of education vs self study vs no study at all to become

a pharm tech I most like will not post it. I should not take up the time and

site space or email space with such discussion. It belongs elsewhere. I do

apologize for informing you all of what I thought would be important and I think

it is. But what may also dissuade some of you from studying and becomming a

pharm tech via certification.

The truth is this: Wheter you get hired as a pharmacy technician depends upon

the following:

1. Need for pharmacy technicians in your area/state/country

2. Number of job openings in your area

3. Number of job openings for trainees in your area

4. Preparedness for a job interview and qulaity of your resume

5. Need for certified or educated and certified pharmacy techs as deemed by our

state board of pharmacy laws

6. The quality of the Job Search Engines or other means to find job opening

postings or advertisments that you use

7. Networking

8. The speed at which you answer the posted job opening

9. Your timeliness and appearance/grooming for interview appt

10. Your positive/upbeat and team player spirit and attitude during appointment

10. Your flexibilty regarding days, shifts, hours you can work and to accept low

pay in the beginning during this econmical crunch.

11. Your ability to think on your feet during an interview

12. Your passing of math and Trade/generic knowledge in any pre-interview

pre-employment test

POSTINGS

Rather than post the views of every one which will range from " why do I need to

know this or that I don't counsel patients' to 'we should be able to counsel

patients if we have a CPhT' I WiLL POST what this site was intended to post. So

if you have any questions about pharm tech calculations, specific drugs,

medication errors etc for your pharm tech study, I would be glad to post and

answer them .

Ms lilbatz you have done nothing wrong. I however have veered from the path of

the purpose of this site. So I will try to get it back on course.

It is a bleak situation for some in most parts of the country.

I can say that students of mine are still offered positions. I just had one who

was offered a job right after hospital externship in Orange County 3 work days

ago. However because the LIVE SCAN technician failed to add the pharm tech

students SS# into the computer the student must redo the Live Scan/finger prints

and WAIT again. This could take up to 6 months as we all know CA has cut back

staff, has furlows and is SLOW.

Better late than never, but the hospital says they will only hold the job open

for 1 month!

Hope this post has helped someone out there,

I know most of you are not in school.

I would not have this site, if I did not believe it was helping someone who is

not in school, who will not have hands on experience or externship at the time

of taking the PTCB or ExCPT exams, to understand more, to understand better and

to possibly prevent medication errors once that person is certified and working

as a pharm tech. This site serves to be a place to come for more explanation by

experienced techs and educators when study guides have failed or there is no one

to ask. It is not necessarily a place for hot topic discussion. I will leave

that for TAP and others no matter how one sided the postings or

discussions/converstation may be.

Respectfully,

Jeanetta Mastron CPhT BS

Founder/Owner

>

> Doesn't shock me.

>

> Check out http://www.theangrypharmacist.com/

>

> Take a blood pressure pill/Xanax before reading

>

> Scroll to " The Truth About California Pharm Tech Licenses. " Look for December

2nd.

>

> Now TAP says stuff just to stir things up. But the part which is eye opening

is the comment section. I have found most of it to be true.

>

> 1) Most places around here will not do school externships PERIOD.

>

> 2) Techs with trade school certificate are next to unhirable..

>

> 3)Give a tech some education and they think they can run the store.

>

> The guy writing the blog is there to stir up mischief, but the comment section

is most of the attitude I have come across looking for a job here in Michigan.

(Retail, never received a hospital interview yet)

>

> I watered down my resume to just include that I finished the Penn

program. Didn't include I have my PTCB. That was enough to get a position at an

independent retail.

>

> Not a very nice picture out there.

>

> Nan

>

> Michigan

>

> Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

>

[Guest guest]

Should make for interesting reading........

I think the most important issue is how YOU as a technician work with the RPh in

providing the best patient care possible.