I recently had the opportunity to go and job shadow at a nuclear pharmacy! As a future pharmacy student I have been looking at potential options of careers to work towards. I was told about this nuclear pharmacy and knew that I couldn’t pass up this opportunity to learn more and my interests have been piqued. Radiopharmaceuticals is such a unique and new form of medicine that can be used in so many different ways. At first, the thought of nuclear medicine might sound scary but what I learned is that it can be really useful and really quite safe. Every moment I was job shadowing I felt secure, and I noticed that there were numerous checks on the medicine itself. I also learned a lot about what goes on in a nuclear pharmacy. The labs they use are pressurized and sterile to ensure safety and purity. All of the containers are made of lead which means that they can be surprisingly heavy! The nuclear pharmacist started early in the morning (around 1 am) mixing radioactive isotopes with medicine that targets specific parts of the body. These containers holding these mixtures were then sealed and the purity of the samples were tested. Once the medicine was ready and correctly labeled it was prepared to be shipped to hospitals in the surrounding area. I don’t know all of the details of why things were used or how everything works yet. But what I learned is that nuclear pharmacy is safe and really cool! Keep a lookout for an upcoming podcast from the CEWT team on pharmacy technicians and their role in the healthcare industry.