These are unique times in the world of emergency services

 and San Diego County is seeing some significant changes take place. This page will help you understand the landscape of opportunities that exist here in this county, in hopes that you are able to make educated decisions about your career path moving forward.

What is the relationship between Fire and EMS?

 
Generally speaking, when someone calls 911 for any reason, they will receive either a law enforcement response for violations of the law, or a Fire response for all other emergencies. (See “911 calls explained” for more details) When the Fire department responds to a medical emergency, an ambulance will meet that fire apparatus on-scene.

EMS (Emergency Medical Services) and Fire are generally two separate entities, until they are used in concert together to respond to emergencies. That means that, for the aspiring Firefighter/Medic, you must approach gaining experience in these fields as if you are working in two completely separate fields.

In San Diego, Fire and EMS are further separated due to the fact that no BLS (Basic Life Support) ambulance companies respond to 911 calls (In truth, they can and do respond to some large incidents, but no BLS agency holds a contract to consistently run 911 calls). This means that working as an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) on an ambulance in San Diego, you will very rarely respond to 911 calls.
 

 

San Diego County Emergency Medical Services (E.M.S.)

 
San Diego County Emergency Medical Services (EMS) is a branch of the Health and Human Services Agency’s Public Health Services. The purpose of this office to ensure the quality of emergency medical services; to certify/accredit prehospital personnel (read: EMT’s and Paramedics); to develop local policies and procedures with the help of a Medical Director. Currently, the Medical Director is Dr. Bruce Haynes.

The San Diego County EMS office certifies anyone that wishes to work as an EMT or Paramedic in San Diego County. Once you have passed your National Registry exam, at the conclusion of EMT class or Paramedic school, the County EMS office verifies your certificate and will issue you a San Diego County EMS card. This office is also where you can go to get a San Diego County Protocol book, which outlines all the BLS and ALS protocols under which each EMT and Paramedic is legally bound to adhere to while responding to emergencies within county boundaries.

Municipal Fire Departments

What is the difference between all the Fire departments in San Diego County? A municipal Fire Department is one that primarily responds to emergencies within a given geographical area such as a city or a fire protection district.  This is in contrast to fire agencies such as Cal Fire and the US Forest service (described below) which typically respond to incidents that span multiple jurisdictions and work with a variety of different fire agencies on a more regular basis.

Recently, a number of municipal Fire departments have taken steps towards consolidating their fire agencies.  San Miguel and East County Fire have joined to become one agency.  La Mesa, El Cajon and Lemon Grove are all still independent agencies, but they now share the same administration staff.  Solana Beach, Rancho Sante Fe, Del Mar and Encinitas Fire have also followed a similar blueprint.

For the purposes of this website, until any of these agencies complete their mergers and change names or their response districts, we will continue to treat them as separate entities.

Cal Fire and US Forest Service

Cal Fire Stations
US Forest Service Stations

Reserve, Paid-call and Volunteer Fire agencies

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Reserve Firefighter opportunities
Paid-call Firefighter opportunities
Volunteer Firefighter opportunities