I'm interested in hearing more about pharmacology (1 Viewer)

[Tim035]

Pharmacology is definatly my main area of interest at the moment if I'am to stay in a science degree. So if anyone has experience in studying it currently or is a graduate having majored in it I would love to hear more about what it involves doing, career oppertunities etc etc (more so then what I was able to simply read from wikipedia).
I've really enjoyed organic chemistry this semester, the whole concept of going: We have chemical compound A and need to change it into chemical compound B how are we going to do so?
Is this part of pharmacology or is it more focused on the affects of the drugs on body systems?

 

[lala2]

Pharmacology is more focused on the effects of drugs on the body. You will probably learn the two parts of pharmacology--pharmodynamics, which is what the drug does to the body, and pharmacokinetics, which is what the body does to the drug. You'll probably learn a bit about drugs and their ionisation behaviours and how these can interact with such receptors as well. I do pharmacy, so pharmacology is something we're learning too.

We're learning about neurotransmitters and their receptors and effects as well as some drugs that are either agonists or antagonists for those neurotransmitters. Career opportunities--sounds like you could design drugs or take up some sort of position in the research industry or teaching.

 

[Tim035]

Thanks for the information.

 

[xclusv2bhung]

hmm ,
whats the difference between pharmacy and pharmacology ?

 

[lala2]

Pharmacology is really the theoretical stuff about drug interactions with receptors and things. Pharmacy is more the profession associated with treatment of diseases via Western medication (which of course ties in with pharmacology--it'd be nice to dispense someone salbutamol for asthma and know it's a beta 2 agonist), if you see where I'm coming from. Even then, if you are purely money orientated and work in a profit-orienteered or corporate pharmacy like Boots in London, you can probably forget most of what you learnt in your degree.

Is that helpful? :s

 

[xclusv2bhung]

Pharmacology is really the theoretical stuff about drug interactions with receptors and things. Pharmacy is more the profession associated with treatment of diseases via Western medication (which of course ties in with pharmacology--it'd be nice to dispense someone salbutamol for asthma and know it's a beta 2 agonist), if you see where I'm coming from. Even then, if you are purely money orientated and work in a profit-orienteered or corporate pharmacy like Boots in London, you can probably forget most of what you learnt in your degree.

Is that helpful? :s

hahah the start bit i understood but u kinda lost me towards the end too complicated xD !

 

[Sharky22]

If you really like pharmacology, it doesn't mean you can't do pharmacy and become a pharmacologist. So i was told by my lecturers, that Pharmacy students are taught the highest level of pharmacology compared to those in a science course majoring in pharmacology.
In the pharmacy course i'm doing, it contains 3 full years of pharmacology and its probably one of my most interesting subjects.

 

[lala2]

Yeah....my friend's doing Science/Commerce and is majoring in pharmacology, I think, for her science degree, and they only learn the really theoretical stuff and not what drugs are which. Sharky22, which uni are you at? and lotto, adrenergic is quite redundant, I reckon! But my lecturers are either really verbose or really wanna hammer the point in, because they're like:

"Salbutamol stimulates beta 2 adrenoceptors of airway smooth muscle", i.e. in other words, they could just have said: "salbutamol is a selective beta 2 agonist". Having said that, I guess I'm being hypocritical because lotto summed my chunk of a paragraph in four words

 

[Sharky22]

Hey lala2,

I'm at Monash (VCP) and currently in 2nd year. Yourself?

 

[Goodbye]

So why would anyone do pharmacology, like separately? Since Pharmacy > Pharmacology.

And Im guessing pharmac- is more biochem as opposed to organic?

 

[lala2]

Hey lala2,

I'm at Monash (VCP) and currently in 2nd year. Yourself?

I'm 2nd year too, hehe, at Sydney Uni. What does VCP stand for?

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So why would anyone do pharmacology, like separately? Since Pharmacy > Pharmacology.

And Im guessing pharmac- is more biochem as opposed to organic?

You can ask my friend that :s but it's good as general background to pharmacy, if that's where you want to end up going, or med or dentistry or vet science (give you an idea of what you're actually prescribing, and yes, through my hunt for the British Pharmacopeia, I did find a Vet's version of BP). Pharmacology is also good, I guess, for general interest, or if you want to research in the labs and stuff. Most people developing drugs in the labs I would imagine are B.Sc. with pharmacology as their major, rather than pharmacists, who do more "professional" sort of stuff.

Pharmacology--not really chemistry or biochemistry. It's just a whole heap of memorisation but you do need a bit of underlying physiology to understand it, e.g. salbutamol (sorry, my lecturers have been carrying on and on about asthma as the prime example in our lectures) works on beta 2 receptors on airway smooth muscle. Due to the adrenergic response, your airway smooth muscle will relax, allowing your trachea and bronchi to open up and allow you to gulp more air in, in preparation for "running away". Similarly, some of the drugs on the GI tract work by protecting stomach mucosa to prevent peptic ulcers, etc.

Biochem? Well, the only example I could think of is that statins reduce your cholesterol and so reduce atherosclerosis but that's not really pharmacology. Pharmacology = ligand (small molecule, in this case, a hormone, neurotransmitter or drug) + receptor = effect.

 

[Sharky22]

Hey Lala2,

VCP stands for the "Victorian College of Pharmacy".

Most if not all people at our uni call it as VCP rather than Monash. Not exactly sure why but I can definitely tell you that VCP has been there for longer and has only recently in the past 10-20 years merged with Monash to teach pharmacy. (don't quote me on that lol).