The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) at CDC has introduced the U.S. National Response Team (NRT) Emergency Responder Health Monitoring and Surveillance (ERHMS) system. The ERHMS system provides guidelines for protecting emergency responders involved in various types of emergencies and settings and can be used by anyone involved with the deployment and protection of emergency workers.

NIOSH worked with the NRT and a number of federal agencies, state health departments, labor unions, and volunteer emergency responder groups to develop the system. The ERHMS provides guidelines for protecting emergency responders over a full range of emergency types and settings. It is for use by all who are involved in deployment and protection of emergency responders. This includes incident management and response organization leadership, health, safety and medical personnel, and emergency responders.

ERHMS training courses include the following:

ERHMS System

• • Provides the necessary tools for implementing health monitoring and surveillance of emergency response workers.
  • Outlines important procedures for pre-deployment, deployment, and post-deployment.
  • Offers continuing education credits for those who complete the course. Credits include: CEU/CE; CHES; CME; CNE Contact Hours; Pharmacist Contact Hours; and AAVSB/RACE.
  • All emergency response coordinators are encouraged to take this course

ERHMS System: Leadership Training

• • • • Introduces the ERHMS system to leaders in organizations responsible for planning and executing incident response activities.
      • Optimizes the health and safety of response, remediation, recovery, and volunteer workers.
      • The intended audience includes local, regional, state, tribal, and federal personnel who are responsible for the occupational safety and health of responders.
      • Offers 0.1 continuing education units for completing the course.

Find more information about the ERHMS system, including guidance documents and trainings.