Fire/EMS Combined Departments || The Real Pros and Cons
I brought up Fire/EMS combined departments in the USA and ya'll had BIG opinions!
I will be sharing some of the reoccurring themes sprinkled in with a bit of my personal experience.
It is estimated that between 40-50% of EMS services in the United States are actually Fire/EMS combined departments. This typically entails a fire department requiring their employees to obtain an EMT certification and function in the 911 EMS setting.
⬇️ Let’s talk about it ⬇️
PROS
⚡️Benefits ⚡️
The benefits associated with a city, county or state Fire/EMS job can be very competitive. This can include 20-25 year retirement accompanied with the employer matching retirement contributions. Good health insurance and competitive time off accrual might also be available. Although shifts may be loooooong, they are usually set up in a way where the firefighter/EMS provider only works 2-3 days a week.
⚡️Comradery ⚡️
The comradery in a firehouse, some might argue, is incomparable to other jobs out there. This phenomenon is most likely due to the experiences and training you endure with your coworkers. Spending holidays side by side, celebrating family milestones together, doing mundane day-to-day chores, watching out for one another in hairy situations…….you become more like family.
⚡️Morale ⚡️
One of the reported pros was morale. Morale can ebb and flow and be completely situational and even go hand in hand with the above-mentioned comradery. We can speculate that morale may also be higher due to state, county, or city government capital ensuring these employees are taken care of with up-to-date equipment and facilities. This, however, may not be the case with private EMS companies.
⚡️Double the Certifications ⚡️
Employees have more certifications and skills only giving them more options if they choose to go somewhere else. As a bonus, many combined fire departments will pay for these certifications and even support advancing your knowledge with education bonuses and incentives.
CONS
🚫 Double the work 🚫
Double the certifications does not always equal double the fun. Double certifications may mean fighting a house fire in 110-degree weather followed by running a sleepless night of EMS calls with no time to eat or sleep. You may feel utter exhaustion and frustration because you are doing two different full-time jobs.
🚫 The hours 🚫
You only have to work 2-3 days a week. Sounds great UNTIL those days are filled with non-stop EMS and fire calls leaving little to no time to rest. At times, you may need an entire day to recover from a shift. And do kids and spouses stop needing you because you’re tired from shift? No. Does that second job want to see you dragging because you had a long shift at your first job? Nope!
🚫 Being forced into EMS 🚫
Oftentimes young men and women have big dreams of fighting fire and go to the local department to apply. This is when they find out the only way they can do the job is to also obtain an EMS certification. The passion and drive for EMS wasn’t there, it was forced upon them. Realistically speaking, do we typically do a great job at things we were forced into? Do we strive to train hard in things we don’t want to do? Will we eventually become disgruntled and disenchanted once 1 true fire call to every 500 EMS calls becomes our reality?
🚫 If you do love EMS, you will typically be the minority 🚫
One of the most common complaints about Fire/EMS providers (from the perspective of private EMS employees) is that it is evident much more importance is placed on fire trainings/calls than good patient care on EMS calls. Considering that the amount of EMS calls tends to be significantly more abundant, this makes very little sense. To be fair, this all goes back to being forced to do a job you didn’t necessarily want to do. If you do happen to be one of the firefighters who is passionate about EMS, you may be disappointed as the focus of the department may not foster your growth in that area.
🚨 I am well aware this varies from area to area. This is not an attack on your Fire/EMS combined department, in fact, you might find it relatable.🚨
You summed this up nicely and it coincides with my perception of the issue. Once upon a time, when EMS, even advanced EMS care, was little more than BLS and maybe an IV with NS. It kind of made since for Fire to take on EMS given the lack of scope. However, the field has evolved 1000-fold since then. EMS is now comprised of medical professionals who dedicate years to training and knowledge growth. I work in a county 9-1-1 EMS system with Fire as a separate entity. In all actuality, we work more closely with LE than we do Fire. In all honesty, aside from the rare entrapment case, we really don’t even need Fire on scene in most cases. Yes the extra hands are helpful in moving a critical or heavy patient but that’s where it kind of stops. We respond to a lot of psych, overdose, suicide attempts, and shooting/stabbing calls. It’s LE who is with us on each of those, we don’t even want Fire around 99% of the time. At the end of the day, Fire deals with property and EMS/LE deal with people. People are our business and we work hard to handle our business in a meticulous and caring manner. I’ll be moving soon and won’t be able to commute to my current agency. When I’m looking for a new job, if I have to apply for a Fire Dept, I will only do so if they have an EMS-only career path. If I can’t find that, I’ll work in an ER until I find the right fit. My opinion, EMS should be it’s own entity.