Medical-Legal Advocacy Clinic

L02 2543/2544 Professor Paula Galowitz Professor Debra J. Wolf Open to 3L and 2L students Maximum of 8 students		Fall semester 6 credits* No prerequisites or co-requisites.

Course Description
This clinic employs a multidisciplinary and holistic approach to provide legal advocacy in a medical setting for clients referred by medical professionals. Many legal-related issues can affect the health of low-income families and many of the problems that affect the health of the children and families have legal remedies. This clinic is a medical-legal collaboration to improve health outcomes for patients/clients by providing on-site legal advocacy assistance and training to medical providers. 

In the coming academic year, the clinic’s fieldwork will be based for the first time at LegalHealth. LegalHealth partners with medical professionals to provide free legal services in medical facilities for low-income people with serious health issues and trains health care professionals on the legal issues affecting their patients. When the Medical-Legal Advocacy Clinic was offered in the spring, 2007 semester and fall, 2007 semester, the clinic’s fieldwork was based in the Bronx and cases were referred by social pediatric residents at Montefiore.

LegalHealth, established in 2001, is a division of the New York Legal Assistance Group, a nonprofit organization that offers free legal assistance throughout the metropolitan area to those otherwise unable to afford attorneys. Through partnerships with hospital and community organizations, LegalHealth offers a range of legal services to New Yorkers with chronic and serious illnesses. It provides free legal services onsite in thirteen hospitals in New York City, including Bellevue, Beth Israel, Kings County Hospital, Mt. Sinai and St. Luke’s-Roosevelt. It assists over 3,000 clients and trains over 1,500 healthcare professionals yearly.

Patients are referred to LegalHealth by their physicians and social workers to obtain legal assistance on non-medical issues. LegalHealth helps patients resolve problems that could adversely affect their health or access to healthcare. For example, attorneys have helped asthma patients living in roach-infested apartments negotiate better housing. 

Physicians are also taught by LegalHealth attorneys to listen for non-medical information patients bring them and to better screen for potential legal problems. They are also trained about the benefits of medical-legal collaboration for their patients and for the two professions. 

LegalHealth is one of the most established of the medical-legal partnerships that have been created nationally. More information about LegalHealth can be found on the LegalHealth website: 

www.legalhealth.org. More information about medical-legal collaborations can be found in Retkin, Branfield, Lawton, Zuckerman and DeFrancesco, Lawyers and Doctors Working Together—A Formidable Team, 20 The Health Lawyer 33 (October 2007).

Fieldwork
The fieldwork has a three-fold approach: 1) direct client representation; 2) education of the healthcare professional about identifying legal issues and incorporating advocacy into their treatment plans (perhaps also including community education); and 3) identifying and exploring a systemic health care issue and presenting strategies to address the issue.

The direct representation part of the fieldwork will be working with LegalHealth in their legal clinics in the hospital site(s). Students will work on cases of LegalHealth. The cases will be referred by physicians and social workers to obtain legal assistance. We will interview the clients at the hospital, in clinics that will primarily take place on Friday mornings. One of the sites will be in the Pediatrics Clinic at Mount Sinai Hospital, which is on Fridays from 9:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. The advocacy will be in a variety of areas, including housing, public assistance, Medicaid and other government benefits.

The Seminar
The seminar will meet weekly for three hours. Some of the seminar classes may take place at the offices of Legal Health.

The topics covered in the seminar include collaboration and interdisciplinary work; holistic advocacy; interviewing and counseling; cultural competencies; negotiation; theory of the case; formal and informal advocacy; ethical issues, including confidentiality; substantive law training and case project presentations.

Particular Scheduling Issues for this Clinic
The nature of this clinic necessitates that the law students in this clinic block out certain hours each week to be available for the seminar and fieldwork. In addition to the three hours for the seminar on Tuesday, students would need to be available on Friday mornings for the legal clinic, when clients will be seen for legal appointments. Although students would not invariably be at the legal clinic every Friday, the students would need to block out that time from their class schedule so that they can be available at this time when needed.

Application Procedure
Students interested in applying for the clinic should submit the standard application, resume, and a transcript online through CAMS. Dulcie Ingleton will call to arrange a date and time for an interview. If you have any questions, please contact Ms. Ingleton at (212) 998-6446 or dulcie.ingleton@nyu.edu.

Student Contacts
Students who wish to know more about the Medical-Legal Advocacy Clinic may speak with the following students who were previously in the clinic:

Fall 2007                                                     Spring 2007
Courtney Cross                                             Rebecca Antar
Jeannie Rose Field                                         Marcia Del Rios
Caroline Bersak Hyde                                    Sienna Fontaine
Carly Leinheiser                                             Njoki Gatimu
Candace Martin                                              Carrie Johnson
Amanda Ryan                                                Ramya Kasthuri
Stephanie Tyree                                             Lara Samet
Shannon Wilson                                             Eva Wheeler


* 6 credits includes 3 clinical credits and 3 academic seminar credits.