Health and Legal Institutions and Practice Transformation

MLP | Boston offers training and education programs to physicians and allied health care providers to facilitate clinicians’ use of medical-legal partnership as a tool to improve the health and wellbeing of vulnerable populations.

Our teaching model employs a case-based approach to enhance the understanding of social determinants of health among front-line health care professionals, and to empower them to address these factors as a part of their clinical practice. Our model has 5 key learning objectives:

1. Describe common social determinants of health;
2. Screen patients for legal or social barriers to health;
3. Identify  laws and systems that govern these barriers;
4. Diagnose patients with unmet legal needs in consultation with and/or by referral to a legal partner; and
5. Treat patients with unmet legal needs with effective interventions.

In order to accomplish these objectives, health care professionals need a method for eliciting a history of social circumstances that is practical and focuses on the specific domains that are both vital to patient health and amenable to direct intervention. MLP | Boston uses a mnemonic device, I-HELP^SM, to promote screening for unmet legal needs in these domains.

I-HELP^SMaddresses issues that have been shown to directly impact patient health and wellbeing, including Income supports; Housing and utilities; Education and employment; Legal (immigration) status; and Personal and family stability and safety.

Many of our educational materials and toolkits, including our I-HELP advocacy guide for clinicians, are available online and can be downloaded from our Resources for Health Care Providers.

To request additional information about the training and education programs offered by MLP | Boston, please contact Tibrine da Fonseca, Paralegal.