In April, Maryland Carey Law students representing the Clinical Law Program and the Medical-Legal Partnership Clinic spoke at the Emerging Issues in Healthcare Law Conference, sponsored by the American Bar Association (ABA).
Second-year Clinic students Lydia Lockwood ‘24, Kennedy Hagens ‘24, and Isabella Datillo ‘24 had the opportunity to present at the American Bar Association’s Emerging Issues in Healthcare Law Conference in New Orleans, Louisiana. The focus of the presentation centered around their experience in the Maryland Carey Law Medical-Legal Partnership (MLP) Clinic over the past two years and insights gained from utilizing interdisciplinary collaboration to improve legal, as well as physical and mental health outcomes, for vulnerable clients. They shared firsthand accounts of developing partnerships with different disciplines in health care to better advocate for their clients and discussed how to address legal and other issues through collaborative efforts.
Professor Sara E. Gold, who directs the MLP Clinic, shared that “Isabella, Kennedy, and Lydia epitomize what it means to be client-centered and trauma-informed lawyers. Their appreciation of the role that a lawyer can play in improving physical and mental health outcomes, and the importance of collaborating with other professionals as part of an interdisciplinary team, will undoubtedly enable them to continue to make a difference in the lives of many clients. I am so privileged to have had the opportunity to work with them over the past two years.”
Their presentation also resonated deeply with Conference attendees, sparking interesting discussions, networking conversations, and an excitement to engage with MLPs in their own practice. The editor of ABA Health eSource and ABA Health Lawyer shared that “everyone at [the Conference] was talking about [the] presentation on [their] work in a medical-legal partnership.” The ABA’s Health Law Section Chair also highlighted the presentation in her Chair’s letter for the April issue of eSource. She shared that Lydia, Kennedy, and Isabella “did an amazing job presenting their work with an MLP. I heard from so many attendees how impressed they were with the students, and I could not agree more. The future is bright for these up-and-comers.”
The ABA reached out after the conference to share that the students’ work “would be really valuable to the rest of our membership” and asked if they would be willing to write an article on the topic for ABA Health eSource. Their piece will be published in the July edition of the Health Law Section’s newsletter.