Community Sustainment Medical Specialist
Care in place when definitive care isn’t accessible.
In a paralytic disaster — a regional event that overwhelms or removes access to definitive medical care for an extended period — communities need medical providers who can deliver sustainment care where they stand. The Community Sustainment Medical Specialist program prepares providers to deliver urgent care and sick call to a defined community population of up to 500 people for 30 to 60 days. Care is delivered either by teams of physicians, PAs, or NPs working alongside CSMS-trained EMS personnel, or by independently deployed CSMS-trained EMS personnel supported by real-time telehealth supervision.
The role draws on three proven operational frameworks: the FEMA Urban Search and Rescue Medical Specialist position, the International Maritime Organization Medical Person In Charge standard, and civilian remote-medic models from the resource extraction industry — each a paramedical role functioning at the edge of definitive care with delegated practice authority, a bounded expanded skill set, and structured remote consultation.
WHO IT’S FOR
Primarily EMS personnel: open to all EMS license levels, no prerequisite. Also well suited to physicians, PAs, and NPs who want to develop urgent care skills.
For EMS personnel, unless the CSMS scope of practice added to the primary license scope of practice by a regulatory authority, all skills are practiced under clinician delegation: this program does not expand any EMS scope of practice and skills apply only in the Community Sustainment Medical Specialist role.
CORE SKILL DOMAINS
Disaster and sustainment care context
Telemedicine-assisted assessment and advanced physical examination
Local and regional anesthesia
Wound management and closure
Soft tissue injury and infection management
Musculoskeletal injury management
Head, eyes, ears, nose and throat procedures
Urinary catheterization
Urgent care / sick-call point-of-care ultrasound and point-of-care laboratory testing
Non-emergency / chronic medication administration and management
Management of common sick-call / urgent care complaints
Principles of public and community health in non-optimal residential settings.
THE COURSE AT A GLANCE
80 hours: 50 hours online asynchronous didactic + 30 hours in-person laboratory
Clinical rotations at the discretion of the supervising authority
Prerequisite for Advanced Community Sustainment Medical Specialist
Included in full within Advanced Trauma and Sustainment Medical Specialist
In-person labs at your location or in and around Bangor, Maine
SUGGESTED PAIRINGS
Maximize a single training trip by combining courses:
+ Combat POCUS: the combined program can be taught over two 10-hour days
ACMS + RESONATE: A three day course that prepares the student for assessing and managing critical patients
ACMS + Ventilator Management for Critical Patients: A three day course that prepares the student for ongoing management and transport of critically ill patients
CME & CEH ACCREDITATION
CSMS is accredited for Maine EMS CEH: Medical 27 · Trauma 39 · Operations 14 and 80 hours of ACCME Category 1 credit.
PRICING
Our instructional philosophy is simple: you’re not buying a course, you’re buying a training program. When you take an F2L training, you get your initial training to achieve mastery and a comprehensive training program designed to maintain your skills once you leave the classroom.
Being able to practice your learning means that you need to have both a longitudinal training program and the equipment in hand to execute that program. Without that equipment, your skills will decay.
Given that, then only real question for any student in deciding what tier of each class to take is what equipment you need to execute the training plan after the class. The class tiers are set up as follows:
Tier 1 - The individual student who needs it all. Each student will leave the classroom with all of the training equipment necessary to perform all the longitudinal training exercises on their own in additional to the longitudinal training program content.
Tier 2 - The team who needs it all. If you work with a team that only needs a single set of training gear for a specific number of students, this is the tier for you. The courses are priced for a specific number of students sharing one set of training gear. If you would like a different ratio of students to sets of training gear, contact us for pricing.
Tier 3 - For those who already have it all. If you have the training gear already, this tier gives you the initial class and the longitudinal training program content; you bring your own training gear to the exercises.
ACMS Pricing
Tier 1 - $7,500 / student
Tier 2 - Team of 5 students - $26,500 ($5,300 / student)
Tier 3 - $4,750 / student
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Bring This Course to Your Team
Courses are scheduled on demand and delivered at your location or in Bangor, Maine.