Disability Training for First Responders: Serving People with Disabilities

Disability Training for First Responders: Serving People with Disabilities

The Ohio Disability and Health Program has produced a one hour training for first responders on working with people with disabilities. This training has been approved for Continuing Education Credit (CEU and CPT) for EMS, fire, law enforcement, and nursing personnel through by the Ohio Pease Officer Training Academy (OPOTA) and OSU’s Center for EMS. A certificate of completion will be issued following training and post-test completion.

Please access the training through the “Online CEUs” tab of the OSU Center for EMS website: https://www.train.org/odh/course/1072437/compilation

This training is designed for law enforcement, firefighters, nurses, and EMTs/paramedics, and covers the following learning objectives:

• To identify barriers that first responders face in serving people with disabilities and to provide and demonstrate effective methods to overcome these barriers.
• To provide first responders with the information and methods that will help to ensure effective and appropriate communication between first responders and people with disabilities.
• To provide guidance on how to identify characteristics or behaviors of people with disabilities that could be mistakenly viewed as threatening, and to identify best practices to avoid escalating the situation.
• To identify groups of people who may need special consideration with regard to transportation or situational orientation and to identify best practices for addressing those needs. These will include a discussion of safe lifting, carrying, loading, and evacuation methods.
• To highlight portions of a Federal law called the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 that are relevant for first responders.  The ADA states that reasonable accommodations must be provided when necessary for people with disabilities to receive the same level of services as the general population.