EMSC History

The Federal EMSC Program is designed to ensure that all children and adolescents, no matter where they live, attend school, or travel, receive appropriate care in a health emergency. It is administered by the United States Department of Health and Human Services’ Health Resources and Services Administration’s Maternal and Child Health Bureau. Since its establishment, the EMSC Program has provided grant funding to all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and five U.S. territories.

For more information about the EMSC Program—when it was created, why it was established, what it has accomplished, and what it hopes to achieve in the future—consult the following reports:

• EMSC Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years 2008-2010: Recommendations of the EMSC Partnership for Children Stakeholders Group

• The Emergency Medical Services for Children Program: Accomplishments and Contributions, Clinical Pediatric Emergency Medicine , 7:1, 6-14, March 2006. 

• EMSC: An Historical Perspective

• Emergency Medical Services for Children, 1993 Institute of Medicine Report

• Emergency Care for Children: Growing Pains  (part of the Institute of Medicine’s 2007 Future of Emergency Care series)

• Hospital-Based Emergency Care: At the Breaking Point (part of the Institute of Medicine’s 2007 Future of Emergency Care series)