Laura got her first pharmacy technician job during her associate’s program and she faced a daunting learning curve. She had to learn a lot of technical skills — filling prescriptions for patients, mixing medications, and preparing IVs. She also learned to navigate a hospital environment and manage communications with doctors and nurses. Laura earned her national certification for pharmacy technicians, and after working in hospital settings for almost ten years, transitioned to a compounding center. In this job, Laura works more closely with the actual production of medicine. “We are making the drugs from scratch, like taking powders and liquids and mixing them together.” Laura says that the most important skill she has developed the job is the ability to multitask while maintaining extraordinary attention to detail. “If you’re running the main counter in the pharmacy, you’re answering phone calls from nurses, you are getting printed papers that are med requests from nurses from all over the hospital. You are having to listen to pharmacists. There might be a window where people are coming to pick up meds and there’s 15,000 things going and you have to keep getting stuff done the whole time and you have to do it correctly and accurately. It’s medication. I can’t send out the wrong thing!”

Today, Laura is looking to change careers because she has gone as far as she can go as a pharmacy technician. She has enrolled in a 9-month IT training program and is gaining certifications. She is optimistic about her future. “There are a million and a half things I could do with any of these certifications. I don’t know them though because I’ve never been in this world before. So like it’s the world is my oyster!”