How hard is NP school compared to pharmacy school?

Nursing Students NP Students

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There's probably not a lot of pharmacists here, but I'm going to give it a shot anyway... I'm a pre-nursing student and I've been debating between FNP and pharmacist as my end goal for a while now. I've actually been interested in pharmacy since high school, but the level of math and chemistry involved in pharmacy have always scared me away. But what scares me MORE is the skills part of nursing. I am more of a book smart person than a street smart person, and sometimes I feel like I'm clumsy and lack "common sense" when it comes to discerning things using my senses (e.g. sight, touch, sound, etc.) As a nurse or an NP, you're expected to use these senses many times to come up with your own diagnosis, which may go wrong and endanger a patient's life. Although pharmacists can also make errors and potentially harm their patients, I think most of their errors would originate purely from their THOUGHT processes, rather than looking at a patient directly and mis-interpreting something like an NP might. NP's are expected to perform most of the duties of a doctor these days, yet the schooling is much longer for pharmacy (4 years vs. 2-3 years) and the degree granted at the end is HIGHER for pharmacy than that of an NP. (PharmD vs MSN, although it's gearing toward DNP now) What do you guys think about this? Is pharmacy school that much harder than NP school? I was actually wondering the same thing about physical therapy requiring a DPT- Not saying that their job is easy, but I'm just not sure if the level of knowledge and liability that is expected of physical therapists is justified by a doctorate degree. Also, would you recommend NP or pharmacy for someone like me? Thanks.

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Specializes in Hospitalist Medicine.

You're trying to compare apples to oranges here. A PharmD doesn't really correlate to what an NP does. There are many different types of NP as well (FNP, AGNP, AG-ACNP, PMHNP, WHNP, PNP, NNP, etc.). The schooling is completely different for PharmD and NPs. You really need to decide what appeals to you more. If you want PharmD, why waste your time in nursing school? Get your undergrad in Chem or Laboratory Science and then go to Pharm school. If you want to be an NP, then you're on the right track.

You need to be very strong in math & chem to get a PharmD, so if math & chem "scare" you, it might not be the right path for you.

What is your ultimate goal?

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Specializes in Psychiatric/Mental Health, Med-Surg, Corrections.

I'm not sure saying that the schooling is longer for PharmD is exactly an accurate assessment. Yes, there is the 4 years vs 2 years...but an NP will have ALSO had ~2 years in nursing school as well as experience as a nurse.

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pharmD means doctorate of pharmacy but workin in the pharmacy sometimes people dont see you as a real doctor with a lot of training in medications. They dont respect you as much as a health care professional but customers do like pharmacists

NPs same stigma but i believe they have more flexibility and versatility in their career. You can even open ur own practice. Pharmacists are being replaced by robots and asked to check way too many scripts than what is safe. Pay is excellent but so is being an NP

about your strenghts in math/chem, it will get u thru the schooling but what about ur career after that?

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Pharmacy is heavy on chem - although, the math is relatively easy and straight forward. It's mostly algebra.

There are programs for PharmD that are a 2+4. 2 years "undergrad" and then 4 years professional/PharmD. Nurse Practitioner will be 4 years undergrad for the BSN and then 2-3 years for the masters or DNP respectively.

The pharmacy market has reached a super saturation point across the country. It's becoming difficult to find jobs. NP/PA are saturated in certain areas but there is so much laterality in specialties it's not difficult to find a job. It might just not be your ideal job.

My first degree was very heavy on chemistry. I had considered pharmacy but I could not see myself doing the actual job. Try finding a pharmacist to shadow.

As for the degrees - it's all a money making scheme. Every health care profession is moving to a doctorate and some simply did it sooner than others. OT, PT, PharmD, AuD, MD, DNP. Don't let the degree race throw you off.

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Specializes in ER.

I can actually speak on this, I believe both are equally hard, and both routes are a lot of work. Before becoming a nurse I did my pre-reqs for pharmacy school and earned an undergrad in biology before attempting to go to pharmacy school. I also worked as a pharmacy tech from the age of 19 to the age of 25 (when I became a nurse), I worked retail, compounding pharmacy, and hospital pharmacy.

For pharmacy school you need ATLEAST 2 years of pre-reqs, some schools prefer bachelors degrees. Then your 4 years of pharmacy school. I believe the pre-reqs for pharmacy school were much harder then what is required for nursing school. I had to take 2 general chemistrys, 2 organic chemistrys, math up through calculus 2 (some just need calc 1 and statistics), Plus 2 physics classes. On top of all of that all of the same pre-reqs for nursing school - micro, A&P, English x 3 courses, public speaking (a specific required course), many also require a HX course and some other things. Also note that pharmacy school is much more competitive and difficult to get accepted to and the market is currently oversaturated with pharmacist, so many of my pharmacist friends have all had hard times getting jobs out of school, it used to be really easy.

Now NP school on the other hand, you need your basic nursing pre-reqs, nursing degree, and usually a statistics class, unless you're going for your nurse anesthetist degree, then you need basically all the same pre-reqs for pharmacy school.

Either way you look at it both degrees all together will take you 6-8 years or more to complete depending on how quickly you get the pre-read and wether you do an ADN or BSN first. If you're going to choose pharmacy make sure you have a rocking gpa, experience, and a great PCAT grade. I had a 3.7 gpa, served as Vice President at my colleges student government and was a certified pharmacy tech and had good experience and didn't get an interview when I applied, I was told my PCAT scores were not competitive enough, I had all A's and B's in my pre-reqs so when I got denied I decided to try nursing school and got in immediately. It's def apples and oranges but I can tell you from experience pharmacy school is a lot harder to get into and more competitive, and I dont mean that to say nursing isn't hard because it is. It's just there's a lot more wiggle room I feel for NP school and even nursing school, but pharmacy school you better have a perfect everything across the board or know someone. Granted I will say that I have always heard they do like accepting nurses, my original plan was to finish my BSN then reapply to pharmacy school, but I ended up falling in love with nursing and direct patient care and ended up axing that idea. So maybe try nursing first if you really enjoy it, stick with that route :). Feel free to PM me with any questions

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Pharmacy school is easy. I'm not sure about np school. DO school is much more time consuming if you want to compare that. Pharmacy school took about 8 hours a week studying for tests in the 3 year Midwestern program. DO took about 24 hours per week outside class at CUSOM. This is just the first 2 years. In my opinion pharmacy is becoming very saturated. Pharmacy is very easy and you'll probably master your job easily in a couple months. Not much math in either. You don't use medicinal chemistry in practice as a pharmacist. I never had people call me doctor. I didn't want to be called doctor with that degree anyways. Hope that helps.

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