Boy am I pooped.
Today we arrived back to Singapore around 1:15am but didn’t get home until after 2am and after settling in to sleep, it was prob around 3am. I woke up at 7am in order to be at work by 8:30am. I think it was good I slept on the plane a bit but was still a bit tired.
I went first to pick up my ID and white coats then headed to the pharmacy for some orientation. I’m assigned to the Cancer Center Pharmacy at NUH. They have two pharmacies, one of Level 4 and the other on Level 8 of the Kent Ridge Wing at NUH. I’ll likely be staying on Level 4 for most of the time. It services all subsidized outpatients and inpatients receiving chemotherapy.
I observed the work flow and learned a bit about their procedures. We went through my training manual and also all the standard operating procedures (SOPs) of the department.
I’m doing something called “pre-registration training” which will last for 3 months. I’m required by the Singapore Pharmacy Board to comnplete these 3 months of training along with passing their forensic exam which will be on December 1st. This training will be good for me to learn about the practice of pharmacy in Singapore.
I learned today about how controlled drug prescriptions are written here and also that they seem to have limited variety of controlled drugs here. For example, in US we have this drug called OxyContin in 10, 20, 40, 80, and 160 milligram dosage strengths. In Singapore, they seem to only carry 10 miligram. Possibly because there is less opiod use or else they have other substances to use. There’s lots of learning to be done here.
I also had Mandarin class today but almost wasn’t going to go as I was tired and there was a solemn feeling everywhere around today. During the recent break, 2 students passed away unexpectedly and there was a moment of silence held at the first day at INSEAD today. Ron said it was a sad day as everyone was in shock and in disbelief. You could feel everyone’s sadness in the air today. The weekend and the week has been a difficult time for lots of people and after a period of mourning… I believe that life will go on.