The purpose of the handbook is to provide a standardized reference document for countries of the Region that clarifies the terms and parameters of each of the twenty goals of PAHO’s Resolution CSP27/10, “Regional Goals for Human Resources for Health (HRH) 2007-2015,”in order that they may be consistently understood, applied, measured and monitored. As a self-contained technical instruction manual, the handbook is intended to provide a practical tool to guide the identification and definition of initial baseline data to be collected in order to provide a descriptive profile of countries’ human resources for health to facilitate monitoring their progress towards achieving their HRH goals over time. (AU)