Career choices of Pharmacy and Pharm D undergraduates: attitudes and preferences

BACKGROUND: The remarkably increasing number of graduated pharmacists necessitates exploring the current Pharmacy and Pharm D students’ future career choices in order to help the health policy makers to enhance effective health and education workforce planning. OBJECTIVE: To identify Pharmacy and Pharm D undergraduates’ attitudes and preferences toward different career choices and the factors that influence their career choice. METHODS: Across sectional study using the online survey web Question Pro was conducted on undergraduate Pharmacy and Pharm D students through the fall semester of the academic year 2019/2020 at four Colleges of Pharmacy in Jordan. In addition to demographics, the survey evaluated students’ attitudes toward different career choices, career choices preferences and how different factors could influence this choice. Mann Whitney U test, Chi-square test, Friedman test, Wilcoxon and Multivariable linear regression were applied to analyze the data. RESULTS: A total of 354 undergraduate Pharmacy and Pharm D students completed the survey. Medical coverage and insurance was the most important variable affecting the students' career choice. The total sample favorite career choice was Academic and Research Centers (mean = 2.57), followed by Pharmaceutical companies (mean = 2.38), Hospital Pharmacy (mean = 2.36), Industry (mean = 1.79), and lastly Retail or Community Pharmacy (mean = 1.78). Males were significantly more tended to have a higher favorability scores for the Pharmaceutical Companies career choice than females. PharmD students had a significantly more favorable attitudes towards Hospital Pharmacy than Pharmacy students, who had a significantly more favorable attitude towards Retail or Community Pharmacy and Industry than Pharm D students. CONCLUSION: The current study provides baseline data necessary to formulate strategies in the educational institutions by incorporating different programs and lectures to expand the capabilities of pharmacy students to meet the requirements of different market sectors and change their mindset about the different pharmacy sectors.