>> This video series gives funeral directors guidance and tips to improve the quality of occupation and industry items on death certificates. Death certificates report on the decedent's usual occupation and industry, which refers to the job a decedent held longest in their lifetime and the corresponding industry. Thank you, funeral directors. We appreciate the time you take to listen to a decedent's loved ones. Funeral directors play a critical role in obtaining the information that researchers need to examine whether a job could be related to a cause of death. On death certificates, occupation and kind of business or industry are used for improving public health prevention and intervention strategies. The tips that follow will help you record this information. Why are we interested in collecting occupation and industry as part of death certificates? Good industry and occupation data can help researchers better understand how work is related to health. Ongoing surveillance using death certificates can also generate questions for further study. One important reason for collecting this information is to detect new associations. Are we seeing something new happening that was never an issue before? And if so, why is this happening and what can be done to stop it from happening again? Another reason is to track known associations and to monitor increases or decreases in deaths by occupation or industry. For example, although we might assume a disease like black lung is no longer a problem, it has recently reemerged, and these changes might be seen in death data. We also may want to determine the overall impact of different causes of death for specific occupations and industries. We would do this to prioritize resources for further research. Finally, gathering and analyzing data about work-related health outcomes will guide research and prevent work-related injuries and illnesses in the future. Please note, we aren't trying to determine how one person's work is related to their cause of death since we can't really do that. We are looking at it from a population perspective. This video series provides guidance and tips for funeral directors to understand and define usual occupation and industry. We discuss common occupation responses, and common industry responses, and how to improve them. We cover special issues, including how to document industry and occupation for people who are self-employed, retired, or had a disability, also company names and acronyms. And lastly, we step you through an example that examines occupation and industry over a lifetime and provide a brief review. Next, we recommend you view Part 2 in the series, which explains usual occupation and industry and why both are important on death certificates. This video was produced by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, delivering on the nation's promise: safety and health at work for all people through research and prevention. To learn more, visit www.cdc.gov/niosh.