Written by Tom Louis
All of us at Emergency Reporting hope this latest message finds you, your agency, and families safe during this difficult time.
Our development team has been working hard to provide you with better ways to document and analyze COVID-19 responses and exposure. First, to recap guidance from the United States Fire Administration and what ER has done so far, please take a look at these sites:
NFIRSGram – Coding Recommendations for COVID-19 Responses
ER Tools for Tracking and Analyzing COVID-19 Responses
NFIRSGram – COVID-19 Special Study
ER Supports the Special COVID-19 Study
Ok, now that you’re all caught up, here’s what new in the system:
- Incident Advanced Search – We added the Special Studies field to the Incident Advanced Search tab. This enables users to search for COVID-19 responses, display the results on the incident grid or map view, and download basic incident data to a CSV file from the Incident module main page.
- Incident Print Page – The Special Studies response(s) (if answered) will now appear on the incident print page:
Report #1795 – Incident Special Study Answer Summary by Incident Type for Zone for Date Range with Special Study Questions – This report is similar to Report #1692, except that it pulls from the Special Studies field(s) instead of custom questions.
- Inventory Module Now Available for ALL ACTIVE ACCOUNTS – Your agency can now better comply with the FEMA Public Assistance Program (“Stafford Act”). Learn more about it in this FEMA Fact Sheet.
Also, here’s some knowledge base articles to get you up to speed on the Inventory module.
Important…local ER administrators (for accounts being upgraded to the Inventory module for the first time) will need to update user roles and permissions to give designated users access to the module.
Lastly, please be sure to join us for a special educational webinar on Wednesday, April 8 at 0800 PDT / 1100 EDT that discusses COVID-19 documentation best practices and how NFPA 1600 – Standard on Continuity, Emergency, and Crisis Management is more important than ever.
Stay tuned for more critical updates to the system in the days ahead. As always, thank you for everything you’re doing to keep your communities safe and thank you for being part of the ER family.
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About the Author:
Tom Louis is ER’s Business Development Analyst. After 22 years of service, he retired from the Green Valley Fire District (AZ) in 2013 as a battalion chief. He has been part of the Emergency Reporting family since 2011, training customers around the world. Tom graduated summa cum laude from Arizona State University with a bachelor’s degree in Fire Service Management. He is an avid reader of both non-fiction books and technothriller novels, loves Mopar muscle cars, and has a soft spot for retired racing greyhounds.
