Child health
IL Governor Signs Stock Asthma Rescue Medication
With help from Legal Council’s children and family advocates, the ‘Stock Asthma Rescue Medication’ bill (SB 3015) has been signed by Gov. Rauner and is now Public Act 100-0726. This…
Read MoreFirst Steps: Launching Our Lead Pilot
Legal Council for Health Justice, in partnership with Erikson Institute and the Early Intervention Training Program, held the first of two trainings for Early Intervention service coordinators and providers as part of the launch of our innovative pilot project “New Approaches to Childhood Lead-Poisoning: Expanding Access to Early Intervention Services.”
Read MoreImmigrant child health and border separations
Law professor Yael Cannon, director of the Medical-Legal Partnership at Georgetown Law’s Health Justice Alliance Law Clinic in D.C, reflects on how child health is being negatively impacted by border…
Read MoreLegal Council Advocates VS. CPS Special Education
After a public inquiry team, led by the Illinois State Board of Education, spent the last five months investigating Chicago Public Schools’ Special Education policies and practices and found significant and unnecessary delays and denials in services, the Board voted Wednesday to approve an independent monitor to oversee CPS as it works to implement changes.
Read MoreNew Ways to Combat Lead-Poisoning
In 2015, 10,322 kids in Illinois had elevated lead levels in their blood–and that’s only the kids tested. Many children don’t have access or aren’t eligible for the services necessary…
Read MoreSpecial education expose
First in a series of investigative reporting from WBEZ reveals the Chicago Public Schools overhauled special education and relied on a “secret” set of guidelines “that resulted in limiting services…
Read MoreReaching the Summit
Legal Council for Health Justice participated in the 12th Annual National Medical-Legal Partnership Summit this past April in Washington, DC. This year’s summit theme—Integrating Health and Legal Services to Transform Care Delivery—attracted a fantastic turnout of dedicated MLP (Medical-Legal Partnership) health care providers, MPH researchers, social work, hospital and health care system administrators and lawyers
Read MoreTraining to Sustain
At Chicago Medical-Legal Partnership for Children (CMLPC) meetings, legal advocates ask questions about cases, share perspectives, and tell success stories. Last week, Sarah Hess, a staff attorney in the UIC Coordination of Healthcare for Complex Kids (CHECK) program, shared a particularly meaningful success.
Read MoreCHECK it out!
University of Illinois-Chicago (UIC) recently informed us that the Legal Council was chosen to establish a program at UIC to provide legal services to children who are cared for through the Coordination of Healthcare for Complex Kids (CHECK) program. This will allow the Council to grow our children’s program and hire additional legal staff to handle the significant demand. We will be able to bring on an additional attorney and two paralegals for the CHECK program.
Read MoreNo place like home
Yesterday, federal district court Judge Charles P. Kocoras issued a court order requiring HFS [Illinois’ Medicaid agency] to “take immediate and affirmative steps to provide the very in-home shift nursing services that HFS approved.”
More than 1200 children have been approved for in-home nursing services based on their high level of medical need. Many of these children are dependent on complex medical regimens for routine bodily functions, such as eating, drinking, breathing, and oxygen regulation. Yet, the State failed to arrange for in-home nursing, resulting in unnecessary and costly institutionalization, heightened risk of medical complications, and diminished quality of life.
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