I'm studying pharmacy now, however, i'm into computers and i wanted to learn programming and/or web design (as a hobby). But i wanted to see your opinions on what I could do with computers that will help me with pharmacy (now or in the future); instead of wasting my time on learning stuff that i won't need.

I also have an interest in linux, and i want to seriously learn it better and used it more often. But i don't know, is it worth it?

Any help from health professon's around here or from anybody would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

I was a Pharmacist (practised for 25 years and had my own Pharmacies for 20) and worked as a consultant in the IT side of Pharmacy/Medicine for 3 years. There is some really exciting work going on. I was working in South Africa at the time (before emmigrating to the UK) but had some very interesting interaction with the Health Research Unit at MIT (USA).
Basically the work being done involves getting structured databases going on patients and then devising data analytical techniques to weed out patients/practioners that are costing the funding organisations a lot of money. Its exciting in that in many cases the patient or practitioner needs better education and treatment which in turn can result in both reduced costs and better healthcare and quality of life. This field is very much in its infancy and is of course dependant on organisations seeing the benefits of using these systems. It is my great passion because I see so much future in it. Sadly, Britain, with its NHS system would be the ideal environment to establish such systems, is about 15 years behind the rest of the world in this field and still works with paper. I have therefore been unable to persue this field.
If you live in the States I am sure a few enquiries about health research units will turn up some likely institutions working in this field.

If you are in the USA, then learning computer science is a waste of time for a pharmacist.

There are numerous pharmaceutical systems out there...but it is indeed a pretty stale area, most haven't changed in 15 years. Heck, until last year I think ours was still running SCOunix.

So you guys don;t think i should learn linux on my free time, right?

One word: You can create a Virtual Lab, with no danger of blowing yourself up! Just google "virtual lab" and you'll find the virtual lab project, a distributing computer project wich installs some software, makes experiments and finds drugs!

Your free time is your free time. Do what you really want to do.

You made the statement, "But i wanted to see your opinions on what I could do with computers that will help me with pharmacy (now or in the future); instead of wasting my time on learning stuff that i won't need."

All I'm saying is that all you need to know for pharmacist is how to type. You don't need to know a thing about computers and learning it is a waste of time for the profession. And I'm only talking about pharmacist in America. My wife is a pharmacist.

Pharmacist is stressful enough without stressing about the computer system.