Founded in 1989 at a meeting of employee assistance professionals in Chicago, EASNA serves as an accrediting agent for employee assistance programs in North America. To do this, it provides an independent judgment which confirms whether or not a program is achieving its objectives and meeting the high professional standards set by the field. Launched in 1990 and updated in 1993, these Standards were again updated in January 1998 to reflect state-of-the-art refinements and additions to the original accreditation document.