R+D of New Drugs & How to go about doing it

revz

I've finally decided to make a post on boards asking about this as I'm quickly running out of options, I've emailed countless lecturers in Universities and other contacts and the advice I've been given has quite vague so I'm hoping someone can help.
The job I really want to go into would be the discovery/development of new drugs (Job title = research chemist?). I did my leaving cert last year and am in TCD doing Medicinal Chemistry.

I've always been under the assumption the best way to go about getting something in this line would be to do a Pharmacy degree and specialise in Industrial pharmacy. Pharmacy was my 1st choice but i just missed out (Damn you random selection) last year so I've applied to the CAO again as well as being accepted by colleges in the UK through UCAS.

The last piece of advice I've been given from a girl - who is in a similar job to what I'm hoping for - was that whichever degree I choose to do, I'd have to do a PhD after to qualify for a job as described. She said Med Chem may prove more beneficial as it is very detailed in organic chemistry and doesn't focus on things like the actual administration of drugs (as in Pharmacy), but also made the argument Pharmacy may be a good path to take as the job of being a Pharmacist is available with the degree and would be a good job to have if the R+D role never 'happened' for me.

Basically, does have any advice they can voice on what I've wrote? If you were in my position & could pick between what to do, which do you think you would pick? Which would be more beneficial to accomplishing getting such a job? And would I need a PhD regardless of the degree I have?

Sorry for the long post, And cheers for any help you can give!

Tree

Unfortunately to go into any job with research in the title, you'll need at leaset a PhD, or a decade or three of relevant experience.

So regardless of what degree you start in, the most useful thing to do is a relevant PhD in drug development or similar.

By the end of your degree, you may change your mind about what interests you, and at the very least you'd have a better idea on how to go about it. Email research groups who have written papers that interest you. That's about it for information, vague, but that's how the life path talk goes.

dissed doc

revz wrote: »

Basically, does have any advice they can voice on what I've wrote? If you were in my position & could pick between what to do, which do you think you would pick? Which would be more beneficial to accomplishing getting such a job? And would I need a PhD regardless of the degree I have?

Sorry for the long post, And cheers for any help you can give!

Most R&D of drugs AFAIK is done by pharmaceutical companies. A lot are based in Ireland. As said above, you need to be aiming at PhD level eventually, but it might be worth your while contacting the heads of drug development at some of the large companies in Ireland even meeting them for 10 or 15 minutes to discuss what type of career path they could advise you.

As you mentioned the UK, it looks like you are also considering outside of Ireland. In that case, there are huge amounts of PhD programs in the EU, many of which are fully funded if you get in. We don't have a lot of big development centres in Ireland, but in e.g., Max Planck, etc., there are huge huge centres.