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pharmacist

American  
[fahr-muh-sist] / ˈfɑr mə sɪst /
Also pharmaceutist

noun

pharmacists plural
  1. a person licensed to prepare and dispense drugs and medicines; druggist; apothecary; pharmaceutical chemist.

    Synonyms:
    chemist

pharmacist British  
/ ˌfɑːməˈsjuːtɪst, ˈfɑːməsɪst /

noun

  1. a person qualified to prepare and dispense drugs

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

Etymology

Origin of pharmacist

First recorded in 1825–35; pharmac(y) + -ist

Explanation

When you're sick and need prescription medication, it's a pharmacist who prepares it for you, answers your questions about it, and sells it to you. You can also ask your pharmacist to recommend the best over-the-counter cough drops. If you decide to be a pharmacist, you'll need to study pharmacy, a field of science that's all about making and dispensing safe medicine that works the way it's supposed to. Pharmacists take a lot of chemistry classes to understand how drugs work, and they also study human anatomy and physiology to learn about the way people's bodies react to medicine. In some places, your pharmacist can also give you vaccinations.

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Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Excerpts of an upcoming National Pharmacist Workforce Study — sponsored by a broad coalition of pharmacy organizations — were presented last week at the APhA annual meeting in Phoenix.

From Washington Post • Mar. 30, 2023

Pharmacist Fenil Lalji said the shop’s owners decided to stay open because they lost a family member to the pandemic and wanted to do what they could to help others stay safe.

From Seattle Times • Dec. 25, 2021

Pharmacist Megan Owen is one of the vaccinators and on her busiest day has jabbed about 400 people.

From BBC • Dec. 14, 2021

Pharmacist Jamie MacConnacher discovered the two front tyres of his Land Rover had been flattened on Thursday morning.

From BBC • Nov. 11, 2021

“Here it is. Renault, Jerome E. Son of James R. Pharmacist at Blake’s. The kid’s a freshman, birthday—let’s see, he just turned fourteen. Oh—his mother died last spring. Cancer.”

From "The Chocolate War" by Robert Cormier

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