The bureau contained the PHS divisions that administered cooperative services to U.S. states through technical and financial assistance, and included significant programs in community health, environmental health, and workforce development.

[3] The name of the bureau implied that its programs would be directed towards cooperation with U.S. states, including both technical expertise and financial grants-in-aid, and its functions were quite diverse.

[6] BSS's environmental health programs largely arose from Stream Pollution Investigations Station in Cincinnati.

[10][11] In the late 1940s it expanded into air, industrial, and chemical pollution and radiological health research,[7] and in 1954 it moved to the newly constructed Robert A. Taft Sanitary Engineering Center.

These programs sought to assist the training of dentists and nurses through advice, construction and project grants to states, and traineeships.

[6] BSS began with the three existing Divisions of States Relation, Industrial Hygiene, and Venereal Disease.

[16] In 1967, the Communicable Disease Center took over the Division of Foreign Quarantine from the Bureau of Medical Services.

At the same time, BSS's divisions relating to training and professional development became the Bureau of Health Manpower in 1967, which was absorbed by NIH in 1968.

[18] Most of the CPEHS divisions would then form the core of the Environmental Protection Agency when it was created in 1971,[16][19] except for two divisions that would become the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health within the CDC,[13] and the Center for Devices and Radiological Health within the Food and Drug Administration.

[20] The Chief of the Bureau of State Services was one of the positions holding the title of Assistant Surgeon General.