Introduction
A unique longitudinal study following the careers of pharmacy students is currently underway. The study overall seeks to understand more about employment patterns, early career choices, and levels of job satisfaction of the cohort of students graduating in 2006. These students are the future pharmacy workforce, and this paper reports findings which relate specifically to family-building and anticipated future work patterns of these students.

Method
A survey of the cohort of pharmacy students studying at 14 GB schools of pharmacy was undertaken in the spring of 2005. This was the first survey in a series and had an explicit focus on choices made as undergraduates.

Results
The response rate was 67% (71.5% of respondents were female, 28.5% male). When asked about their general patterns of work over the course of their career, only 15% of all students anticipated they would work full-time until retirement. Comparison between male and female students' expected work patterns demonstrated some striking differences: looking at the highest frequencies for this variable for male respondents, 33% expected to work full-time until retirement, with 26% expecting to work full-time but aiming to retire early; for female students, the highest frequencies were: to work full-time but with breaks for maternity leave (31%); work full-time early on and then part-time later on (20%); and work predominantly full-time with periods of part-time work (19%). The variable also had a significant relationship with collapsed ethnic group (white/non-white): non-whites were more likely to expect to work full-time until retirement and less likely to expect to have career breaks. To help quantify the specific impact of family-building a question asking about expected career breaks for different reasons was put to the students - 62% and 10% of female and male students respectively expected to have a career break to start a family.

Discussion
The profession itself often explains female entry into pharmacy in terms of how the profession allows its practitioners to pursue a career in addition to family-building.1 The potential impact of the growing female presence in pharmacy has previously been raised;2,3 the findings reported here provide strong evidence for the first time that family-building is likely to have a significant impact on the hours female students will work when they qualify as pharmacists. Perhaps employers need to consider how they will accommodate this particular set of expectations, or whether they should begin to try to change them.