Max Mello
Director of Physician & APP Recruitment
Healthcare Recruiting · San Diego, CA
Physician, PA & NP recruiting in San Diego, grounded in the metro's real numbers.
We track the San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA area from federal data that updates every month, the same numbers we use when we take a search. Here is the current picture, and what it means if you are hiring.
Provider supply
Who practices in San Diego today
Individual providers with an active practice address in the San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, CA area, from the federal NPI registry (June 2026).
13,536
Physicians
3,275
Nurse practitioners
1,764
Physician assistants
Over the last 12 months, the San Diego metro added 176 newly enrolled nurse practitioners, 32 physicians, and 70 physician assistants to the registry. New NP enrollments outpaced new physicians: the advanced-practice workforce is growing faster than the physician base, and hiring plans that ignore that mix are competing for the scarcer pool.
Source: CMS NPPES registry, June 2026. Scope: California side of the San Diego metro area.
Demand
What the local employer market looks like
Federal quarterly employment data for San Diego-area healthcare employers.
Hospitals
31,151 employed, up 8.3% year over year. Average wages up 3.1% over the same period.
Ambulatory care
101,411 employed across 9,519 sites.
Source: BLS QCEW county files, private ownership, Q4 2024 vs Q4 2025.
Occupation-level wages are published at state level (see the parent state page); metro wage signal = QCEW average weekly wages above. See California pay ranges →
Shortage pressure
57 federally designated primary care shortage areas in the San Diego area.
0 of them score in the high-need range. If your facility sits in or near one, you are not imagining it: the supply math is against you. That is the search we run every day.
Source: HRSA HPSA primary care detail file.
Tell us about the opening
Hiring in San Diego?
Tell us about the role. We'll give you an honest read on the local market for it: who's movable, what they expect, and a realistic timeline.