Well the salaries of Pharmacists have only recently become high.  Most of
the time that I worked at Sinai Hospital in Detroit, MI years ago my salary
was not much higher than that of the automobile workers for Ford Motor
Company.  A staff pharmacists did not make that much money, nothing like
middle management Ford Executives.  We generally got a cost of living
allowance about equal to the inflation index.  There was no shortage of
pharmacists then, only people willing to work for what the hospitals paid.
The influx of women pharmacists has helped make a shortage.  A woman is
supposed to put her family and kids ahead of making money and that requires
part-time work or staying at home.

Filling prescriptions is liking flying an airplane.  Most of the time it is
very routine and must be very organized.  It is not very exciting.  More
like boring as most pharmacies do not have outside windows to look out of..
You DO have to know what you are doing with doctors scribbling prescriptions
and with all the similar sounding brand and generic names. Look up some
lawsuits involving pharmacies that have dispensed incorrect drugs which
resulted in the death of patients. A  liquid prescription just killed a kid
in Japan.  The hospital pharmacists dispensed a liquid ten times too strong.
Actually standing up all day, answering multiple telephone calls, doing
several important things at once, and dealing with irate customers and
insurance companies is not all that pleasant.

Healthsystem or hospital pharmacy, where I am,  is an alternative type of
pharmacy practice. There is a great deal more clinical involvement in
hospital practice, and since, in the case of my hospital,  we have no
outpatient division, none of the bother of community pharmacy practice (no
third party "negotiations", no angry public, no telephone ear, we have
regular meal breaks, and we do our work sitting down). Nurses and physicians
depend upon us for a range of drug information from the mundane to the
occasionally complex. Sure, there is some tedium, but there is a definite
sense of need. Dosage units (tablets, capsules and the like) are dispensed
by the unit dose, individually packaged, and we do what only a small number
of community based pharmacies do---prepare sterile products such as large
volume IV fluids and intermittent or continuous IV medications (antibiotics,
narcotics, cardiovascular).

I worked retail for 12 years prior to this, and hospital practice is far and
away the better environment. Also, the traditional salary gap between retail
and hospital practice has closed. Used to be hospital earned less. Not true
any more.

I am a community pharmacy and we do not count pills..our techs and robot do
that
There is not a day that goes by where I don;t make a difference.
Explain dosages to an elderly person
Catch wrong drugs or doses called in by offices
Catch wrong directions
Catch interactions

But if its the money, forget it.
You will be miserable in a short time.  We already have enough
of you and the profession is suffering
jp