You may have heard that the pharmacy technician position is one of the fastest growing fields in America today, but how exactly is a pharmacy technician salary earned? What is the nature of his work and what does he do on a daily basis? A pharmacy technician’s position is to help the pharmacist prepare prescription medicines, handle customer service and take care of office duties inside the pharmacy itself.
Typically, the pharmacy technician salary is paid to those who receive the pharmaceutical requests, count the tablets and label the medication bottles. While some of his duties may overlap with those of a pharmacy aid, some smaller employers may expect the pharmacy tech to take care of all the administrative and clinical duties.
Each state has its own rules and regulations about what the technician may do to earn the pharmacy technician salary, but typically, they will speak with the patients and take their written prescriptions, handle electronically transmitted requests from their office and in some cases, process the phone requests from the doctor’s office. Attention to detail is a must as information must be verified as complete and correct.
In preparing prescriptions, the technicians obtain, count, pour, weigh, measure and sometimes even mix the medicines. Additionally, it’s the responsibility of the pharmacy technician to prepare the labels, select the containers, print and attach the literature to the prescription and submit to the pharmacist for approval. The technician will always send any questions about the medications, reactions or health inquiries to the actual licensed pharmacist.
While 75% of all pharmacy technician positions are in retail settings, there is also a need for this position in hospitals, nursing homes, and assisted living centers. In these locations, there are more responsibilities such as preparing sterile solutions and taking medications to the nurses and physicians. There are additional record keeping duties involving recording medication into patient’s profiles. Often times. the pharmacy technician salary will be greater in a situation like this.
The pharmacy technician can expect to be on their feet a great deal, work varied work schedules that include nights and weekends as well as holidays. The average pharmacy technician salary is approximately $14 per hour.
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