Pharmacology Salary

By an allied health world contributing writer
Published: March, 1 2010

Pharmacologists are an elite group of highly skilled scientists with a deep knowledge of mathematics, biology, human anatomy and chemistry, and the complex interactions that drugs have on different types of people. School for pharmacologists is long and expensive. Not surprisingly, pharmacologists can command a high salary. According to Indeed.com, their salaries are 59% higher than the average of other salaries nationwide, averaging about $103,000.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (a division of the U.S. Department of Labor) has high hopes for the pharmaceutical and medicine manufacturing industry. Oddly, it joins pharmacologists with zoologists, saying they both study the effects of drugs on animals and, in their listing, uses the term biochemist to describe professionals who study how drugs affect the processes and workings of the human body by analyzing the metabolism of ingested medicines and looking at the chemical combinations that are regulated by a person’s heredity and environment.

Truth be told, pharmacologists may play many different roles in medicine production, depending on schooling, specialty and experience. With a pharmacology degree, these professionals could be medical scientists or biochemists, earning more than $42 an hour as they administer experimental drugs to sick or healthy volunteers to judge side effects and proper dosage.