Cathy Smith

Job Title: Formulation Chemist

Company: Cardinal Health Australia

City of Residence: Melbourne

Degree: Chemistry Degree Bachelor of Formulation Science (Hons), Victorian College of Pharmacy , Monash University

Cardinal Health is a contact manufacturing company that makes health and nutritional as well as OTC tablets and capsules for other companies. I am involved in trouble shooting problem products, evaluating new raw materials, formulating new products, supervising pilot batches within the manufacturing plant. I enjoy the specific innovative projects the best as they allow me as a formulator to think outside the box and help to create something that has never been created before. When I walk into a Pharmacy and see products I have worked on it gives me a real buzz to know I played a part in getting that product onto the shelf!

I chose to do the course because I was interested in science and chemistry but I didn't just want to do testing or work on a lab bench all day. The course also provided me with the opportunity to work in any industry imaginable! Every industry needs new products and development.

If you have a flair for ideas and like science then this is definitelythe course for you. Even if you don't fancy yourself as an inventor as such (as I certainly didn't) you learn the capabilities of the industry you are in and you can find what's lacking and that's where development comes in!

In the future I hope to one day be in a managerial role where I can oversee all different departments that are involved in the success of a product. These range form marketing and sale to formulating to business planning and much more!

Go to the Victorian College of Pharmacy