Resource Library

Deployed Response Teams (USAR / DMAT / DMORT)

Who this is for: Urban Search and Rescue, Disaster Medical Assistance Team, and Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Team members, and other federal or state teams deployed away from home.

Deployment to disaster scenes brings with it a new set of challenges to the holistic health and wellness of a responder that is different than the stressors that are more typical for responders working in their community on a day-to-day basis.  Some of those unique stressors are: being away from their home and family for an extended period of time, working in unfamiliar systems and communities, rotations that can often require the responder to work 24 hours or more without a break, and shifts that can be extended up to 21 days. Federal guidance states that fatigue needs to be viewed as an organizational responsibility and not a personal failing.  This guidance calls for incident-specific fatigue management plans, real work-and-rest scheduling, and command-level ownership of the problem (The National Response Team provides the Guidance for Managing Worker Fatigue During Disaster Operations as a two-volume manual to help organizations prevent and manage exhaustion during large-scale emergency and recovery work.).

For teams such as D-MORT, doing victim identification and mortuary work, the exposure is even more nuanced. INTERPOL's guidance on occupational trauma in DVI work identifies two forms of exposure: direct exposure through observing bodies affected by mass death, and indirect exposure through absorbing the stories of survivors and families. It also identifies shift schedules, break cycles, and role clarity as protective factors that reduce harm. (INTERPOL DVI Guide). Returning home brings its own transition. CDC and NIOSH identify a post-deployment check-in as a minimum standard of care, recommending that it take place during demobilization or within one to two weeks afterward rather than being left to chance. Whether you are preparing to deploy, currently in the field, or finding your footing after returning home, the resources below offer support for each stage of that journey.

CSTS: Emotional Reactions to Human Bodies in Mass Death

A fact sheet built specifically for first responders who see, smell, and handle human remains during disasters. It normalizes reactions like horror, numbness, and even dark humor, and gives practical steps for coping in the field such as hydration, adequate nutrition, limiting exposure when possible, and leaning on peers. The fact sheet also suggests when to seek help. If a responder experiences anxiety, low mood, sadness, or trouble sleeping that lasts for more than two weeks after returning home, they may need to consider seeking support services such as counseling, chaplaincy, or peer support (Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress).

CSTS Mass-Fatality Resource List

A companion index of fact sheets for supervisors and responders doing body-recovery and mass-death work, including guidance on notifying families of the dead or missing and supporting military and disaster workers involved in recovery operations (CSTS).

CDC/NIOSH Post-Deployment Guidance

The federal framework for disaster response team demobilization. This out-processing check-in is designed to provide quick psychoeducation and potentially catch health and wellness problems early in hopes of preventing issues from surfacing months later (CDC NIOSH).

Guidance for Managing Worker Fatigue During Disaster Operations

Federal guidance built for the organizations running deployments, covering work-rest scheduling, fatigue risk assessment, and the roles leadership plays in preventing burnout across a long rotation (U.S. National Response Team).

Returning Home After Disaster Relief Work

A SAMHSA post-deployment guide for responders coming back from a deployment, covering self-care before returning to routine, common signs of stress, and when to reach out for professional help (SAMHSA / hosted by OSHA).

Tips for Families of Returning Disaster Responders

A companion guide for the families waiting at home, explaining what the transition back can look like and how to support a returning responder as well as themselves (SAMHSA PEP23-01-01-008).

Disaster Distress Helpline

Call or text 1-800-985-5990, whether currently deployment, demobilized and have returned home, or anytime a disaster has caused distress. First responders and rescue, recovery, and relief workers are named among the populations this line serves (SAMHSA).

Emergency & Incident Management Teams (IMT / EOC / Command)

Who this is for: Incident Management Team members, Emergency Operations Center staff, and Incident Commanders and command staff.

EOC and IMT personnel will primarily absorb the trauma of a disaster through information they hear or see in photographs rather than through the scene itself, although there are incident management team members that may still have direct exposure to the incident. Emergency managers have frequently discussed the stress they and others feel inside an EOC. They name decreased memory function, trouble concentrating, impaired judgment, rigid thinking, decision fatigue, and perfectionism as issues they contend with, especially the longer they are in operational mode. The uniqueness of this work and the stressors they feel is in the fact that many of the individuals work in the EOC may never be physically near the disaster but they carry the weight of the many decisions they are required to make (Domestic Preparedness). A survey of more than 900 emergency managers backs this up, tying secondary traumatic stress and organizational culture directly to both well-being and whether people stay in the field at all (Journal of Emergency Management), and a 2025 conference poster found that emergency managers confident they could access mental health support reported suicidal ideation at roughly half the rate of those who were not (IAEM). The strongest fix found in this research is not a one-time debrief after the fact, but support built into the rhythm of the response itself. California's incident command doctrine, for example, treats peer support as a resource an Incident Commander can formally order, the same way you would order any other resource on scene (FIRESCOPE ICS 180). If your work has kept you at a desk, a radio, or a command post rather than the scene, that distance does not make the toll any less real.

FIRESCOPE Critical Incident Peer Support (ICS 180)

A formal Incident Command System position: a Critical Incident Peer Support Team that an Incident Commander or Incident Management Team can order directly, reporting to Command Staff. Services include confidential one-on-one support, needs assessment, defusings, and escalation to a licensed clinician when needed, plus chaplain support on request (FIRESCOPE).

FEMA NIMS Critical Incident Stress Management Team

A nationally recognized, formally typed resource that lets any jurisdiction request behavioral health support the same way it would request any other incident resource, delivering psychological first aid, informational briefings, and referrals for follow-up care (FEMA Resource Typing Library).

Stress First Aid

A public-domain framework built around seven simple actions, Check, Coordinate, Cover, Calm, Connect, Competence, and Confidence, designed for peers and leaders to catch stress reactions early rather than waiting for a crisis. Free training materials are available for download and can be adapted to command post and EOC settings (VA National Center for PTSD).

Disaster Stress Management in an Emergency Operations Center

A practitioner's guide written specifically for EOC staff and leaders, addressing how to spot secondary traumatic stress in a command environment and build a real plan for shift sharing, backup coverage, and access to support during long activations (Domestic Preparedness).

IAEM Mental Health and Wellness Caucus

A group inside the International Association of Emergency Managers working to put mental health and wellness at the center of emergency management culture and reduce the stigma around asking for help. Reach the caucus at MentalHealthandWellness@iaem.com (IAEM).

NWCG Critical Incident Stress Management Desk Reference

Built for the wildland fire community, this model shows how a Critical Incident Stress Management team can be requested through an existing coordination structure, delivered by trained peer supporters alongside a mental health clinician, once immediate safety needs are met (National Wildfire Coordinating Group).

911 Telecommunicators

Who this is for: emergency dispatchers and 911 call-takers.

You do not have to be physically present at a scene to be injured by it. A study of 171 telecommunicators found that hearing a traumatic call produces distress closely tied to PTSD symptom severity, concluding plainly that "direct, physical exposure to trauma may not be necessary to increase risk for PTSD in this population" (Pierce & Lilly, 2012). Research into public safety communicators describes a specific kind of injury that comes from this work: moral injury, the pain of repeatedly being unable to do what you know is right, whether that is staying on a line while someone dies, or being unable to send help fast enough (Malloy et al., 2021). Other aspects of the job compounds these responses such as mandatory overtime, a sedentary console, and rarely getting closure on how a call actually ended are named as dispatch-specific stressors, separate from what is heard on any single call (Cordico). The national standard for the profession now requires 911 centers to build a real stress-resilience plan covering training, peer support, and long-term support after major events, precisely because this exposure has been underestimated for so long (NENA Standard 002.2-2022). If you feel disregarded because you were not physically at the scene, the resources below were built by people who can relate to your experiences.

APCO Health & Wellness

The national association for public safety communications runs a dedicated Health and Wellness Committee producing research on dispatcher fatigue, wellness benefits, and specialized training, including a 2026 course training EMDR therapists specifically to treat 911 professionals (APCO International).

NENA Standard to Protect the Wellbeing of 9-1-1 Professionals

The formal national standard directing every 911 center to build a real stress-resilience plan: training on 911-specific stressors, peer support, critical incident stress management, sleep, and long-term support after high-impact events (NENA).

911 Training Institute

Founded specifically for 911 dispatchers by a licensed mental health professional, offering courses like Survive & Thrive and The Power of Peer Support that directly confront the "suck it up" culture around the job (911 Training Institute). Their free Post-Tragedy Care Checklist helps leaders support their teams for months after a line-of-duty death, mass casualty event, or natural disaster, not just in the first 48 hours (911TI).

911der Women

A national nonprofit built specifically for women in the 911 profession, offering wellness programs, training, and a community of dispatchers who understand the job firsthand, including first-person accounts of working disasters from behind the console (911der Women).

Help For the Headset

Training and a curated peer support resource library built by and for 911 dispatchers, including sample peer support policies, conversation starters, and articles written specifically about dispatcher trauma and moral injury (Help For the Headset).

Cordico Dispatch

A confidential, 24/7 wellness app built specifically for dispatch centers, with content addressing the sedentary nature of the console, mandatory overtime, and the lack of closure that comes with never knowing how a call ended (Cordico).

Code Green Campaign

A first-responder mental health advocacy nonprofit that explicitly names dispatchers among the responders it serves, alongside firefighters, EMTs, and police (Code Green Campaign).

Crisis support

Call or text 988 anytime, or text BADGE to 741-741 for a crisis counselor familiar with responder work. Both lines are open to telecommunicators, even though no dispatcher-exclusive crisis line currently exists nationally (ResponderStrong).