Pre-Pharmacy Program

Students who are interested in pharmacy as a career can prepare themselves by enrolling in the PPHS program (pre-pharmacy track) at EMU with a suggested major in either biochemistry or biology. In keeping with the changing trend of the profession of pharmacy, our pre-pharmacy program enables students to complete undergraduate course requirements that are needed to enter graduate pharmacy programs.

Pharmacist Education

The profession of pharmacy is transitioning to a requirement of a Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD) degree program for new students. In the past, most practicing pharmacists held a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy that allowed them to dispense medicines. Today, the increase in number and usage of prescription and over-the-counter medications, the evolving role of pharmacists in direct patient care, and the increase in complicated drug regimens have necessitated the enhanced training of practicing pharmacists on the doctoral level.

What Should You Expect from an EMU Education?

As a profession, pharmacy is growing both in opportunities and in the increase in demand for more pharmacists. The number of applications to pharmacy schools is increasing each year with the better trained students gain admission while those under prepared are denied admission.

Our goal at EMU is to prepare pre-pharmacy undergraduate students so that they will be competitive and gain entrance into the graduate pharmacy program of their choice. Entrance into pharmacy school is based on several factors:

1. successfully finalizing PharmCAS (Pharmacy College Application Service) forms;
2. completing core science courses;
3. scoring well on the PCAT (pharmacy college admissions test);
4. letters of reference; and
5. pharmacy and/or research related experiences as an undergraduate student is recommended.

Here at EMU we accomplish our goal of excellence in preparing the pre-pharmacy student due to our strong core courses of chemistry, biology and physics courses, our knowledgeable teaching faculty, and our unique global perspective.

PharmD programs in Virginia

• Hampton University School of Pharmacy, Hampton, Va: http://www.hamptonu.edu/academics/schools/pharmacy/index.htm
• Shenandoah University Bernard J. Dunn School of Pharmacy, Shenandoah, Va: http://pharmacy.su.edu/PharmWeb
• University of Appalachia College of Pharmacy, Oakwood, Va: http://www.uacp.org
• Virginia Commonwealth University School of Pharmacy, Richmond, Va: http://www.pharmacy.vcu.edu/

Further Information

• PharmCAS provides information about applying to graduate level pharmacy schools: http://www.pharmcas.org

• PCAT gives information needed to prepare and register for this required entrance examination for pharmacy schools: http://www.pcatweb.info

• American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy provide a lot of information about the profession of pharmacy, detailed information about the accredited American schools of pharmacy, and information about entrance requirements into the various schools: http://www.aacp.org