The original pharmacist who marketed Tylenol into becoming what it is today passed away last month, a blow to the pharmacy world, but he remains an inspiration to many students of pharmacy.  Robert McNeil was a third-generation pharmacist and immediately went to work for his grandfather’s company, McNeil Laboratories, after graduating from pharmacy school in 1938.  The once small-town drugstore morphed into a large company within only a few decades of hard work by McNeil’s father and grandfather, presenting McNeil with the perfect environment for a recent pharmacy graduate.  At this time in the pharmaceutical industry, it was not essential to receive a masters or a PharmD, and as McNeil’s story indicates, it remains unnecessary for most pharmacists to receive further education unless they want to teach or continue scholarly research.

After joining the company, McNeil immediately began work on the company’s product line and the development of new prescription drugs, taking an interest in the analgesic prescription drug which was a pain-reliever and yet contained none of aspirin’s negative side effects.  The drug was approved by the FDA and McNeil came up with the drug’s generic name of acetaminophen, which was later shortened to Tylenol.   Only a few years later, McNeil and his brother sold the company to Johnson & Johnson in 1959, after which Tylenol was approved for over-the-counter sale, thus becoming one of the most widely recognized brands, effectively turning Johnson & Johnson into a top pharmaceutical manufacturer.

The rest is history, as Tylenol continues to be a widely recognized symbol within Western culture and has led to new discoveries within this class of drugs (such as the benefits to heart-attack sufferers).   The subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson continues to employ several thousand workers to this day and remains a highly profitable business, again proving that students do not need further years in pharmacy school to become successful in the industry.  While this is a new era in technology and pharmacy programs, most students agree that pharmacy school itself more than adequately equips them for a lifelong career in the industry.  If anything, this story helps to indicate what else students can do besides work in a pharmacy after graduating from pharmacy school.  It is helpful for many students to realize that they do not have to confine themselves into one sector in the pharmaceutical industry, but are free to conduct research for a variety of leading pharmaceutical companies.