Chicago Medical-Legal Partnership for Children

On July 14, 2011 Governor Pat Quinn signed into law amendments to the Illinois School Code (P.A. 97-123) ensuring a student’s ability to maintain his or her academic performance and standing via continued instruction during extended and intermittent medical absence and recovery periods. Home Hospital Instruction (HHI) mandates provision of regular educational and special educational instruction and special educational related services in the home or hospital to students where their medical provider anticipates the student being out of school for two or more consecutive weeks or on an ongoing intermittent basis due to chronic illness or other medical condition.

New MLP attorney Purvi Patel responds to NYT article on transitioning children with chronic illness and disability into adult primary care. Read her letter to the editor on how a good attorney can help to improve continuity of care.

Stephanie Altman, JD, and Amy Zimmerman, JD, of Health & Disability Advocates (HDA), received on June 14, 2011, the annual Loretta Lacey Maternal and Child Health Advocacy Award from the Illinois Maternal and Child Health Coalition.

Amy Zimmerman has heard many say House Bill 628 sounds like it shouldn't be necessary. The bill ensures that parents of children with disabilities will have access to special education classrooms so they can be sure their kids' needs are being met...

Ask Amy Zimmerman C’85 about the people she helps for a living, and the examples come pouring out: “The family with a lead-poisoned child needs legal assistance to relocate to lead-safe housing. The family with a child who is so medically complex that his parent can’t work needs legal assistance obtaining Security Income support. The family with the child who is bipolar and has been recently psychiatrically hospitalized needs legal assistance to be placed by his school district in a therapeutic day school …”