What Are EMS Medical Directors?
Medical directors are medical authorities that are hired by EMS agencies. In Wisconsin, all medical directors are required to be physicians, and all EMS agencies are required to have one. Medical directors are responsible for credentialing EMS providers to practice, serving as a source of expert advice, and ensuring that the agency delivers high quality, safe patient care.
Board-Certified EMS Physicians
Not all medical directors have the same qualifications. While many medical directors specialize in emergency medicine, this is not a requirement in Wisconsin. Amongst emergency medicine physicians, an even smaller number subspecialize in EMS. As of 2024, there were only 1,149 EMS board-certified EMS physicians for more than 23,000 agencies in the United States .
To become board certified in EMS, physicians must pass a board exam that includes a wide range of topics including quality management, leadership and oversight, adult education, occupational injury prevention, dispatch systems, air medical services, legislation and regulation, principles of EMS finance, risk management, incident command, management of mass casualty incidents, disaster medicine, weapons of mass destruction, tactical medicine, technical rescue, research, and more.
EMS physicians have dedicated their careers to EMS, and will bring passion and knowledge to your leadership team.
UW’s medical directors are board certified in EMS and have decades of experience from EMS systems across the entire United States.
Our Leadership Philosophy
All of our medical directors ascribe to a philosophy of servant leadership, and our highest priority will always be the welfare of the EMS providers and the patients they treat.
We partner closely with leadership from each agency to enhance the effectiveness of the leadership team, rather than overtaking it.
Recognizing that every agency’s needs and visions are different, we tailor our medical direction approach to each agency individually. For example, some of our agencies require evening training to support their volunteer members, while other agencies prefer training during business hours for their full time employees. Some of our agencies are busy, urban systems and others are small, rural agencies. We have the ability to be flexible in our approach while still ensuring that we maintain high standards.
