Pharmacy Technician

Pharmacy technicians prepare, supply and dispense medicines and other medical products prescribed for patients.

Community pharmacy technicians work in high street pharmacies, in the pharmacy sections of supermarkets and in pharmacies attached to doctors' surgeries or health clinics. Their duties include:

• assembling, labelling and dispensing medicines accurately, working from prescriptions issued by doctors, nurses or dentists
• advising customers on how to take their medicines or on health-related queries such as help to stop smoking.

Hospital pharmacy technicians dispense medicines prescribed by doctors for in-patients and outpatients. They may also:

• calculate doses and quantities of the medicines required
• issue stock supplies of medicines to wards and hospital departments
• make up individual and batch medicines, nutrition substitutes and pharmaceutical intravenous medicines for very ill patients.

Pharmaceutical industry pharmacy technicians work in commercial laboratories. They manufacture batches of medicines for sale to community and hospital pharmacies. They may also carry out tests.

Community pharmacy technicians usually work 39 hours a week, which may include evening and weekend work on a rota basis. Hospital pharmacy technicians usually work 37.5 hours a week, normally from 9.00am to 5.00pm, Monday to Friday. They are likely to be on a rota for evening, weekend and bank holiday work. Pharmacy technicians in industry usually work from 9.00am to 5.30pm, Monday to Friday.

Many pharmacy technicians are part-time.

Salaries range from around £17,700 to £39,000.

A pharmacy technician should:

• have some ability in science
• be good with figures and calculations
• be very accurate and pay attention to detail
• be capable of keeping records on a computer system
• be able to deal tactfully with confidential information
• be good at explaining information clearly
• have an interest in people's health and well-being.

There are no set entry qualifications to be a pharmacy technician. In practice, employers often ask for at least four GCSEs (A*-C), including English, maths and at least one science subject.

There may be opportunities to get into this type of work through a traineeship or apprenticeship.

Some community pharmacies train their existing staff, such as pharmacy dispensers or assistants, to become pharmacy technicians.

Entrants need to find a trainee post at either a hospital or community pharmacy. Once in the post, they work under the supervision of a pharmacist, training on the job and studying part time for an NVQ level 3 in pharmacy services and other accredited qualifications.

Pharmacy technicians with the appropriate qualifications and work experience can apply to register with the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain (RPSGB).

Community pharmacy technicians may become accredited checking pharmacy technicians or supervisors of a team. They may move into a retail management role.

In the hospital service, there are five pay bands for qualified pharmacy technicians.

Pharmacy technicians working in industry may move into research and development, clinical trials for new products, quality assurance, production, training or management.

Further details