The Peninsula Family Advocacy Program of the Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County is modeled after the FAP started at Boston Medical Center in 1993. Perceiving that a family’s legal problems could interfere with a doctor’s ability to treat a patient’s health, Dr. Barry Zuckerman, Chief of Pediatrics at Boston Medical Center, hired a lawyer to work alongside health care providers in his department. The medical-legal collaboration model has since been replicated in health care settings across the United States.

For more information or to start your own medical-legal collaboration, contact Ellen Lawton, Esq., Director of The Medical-Legal Partnership for Children, at ellen.lawton@bmc.org, or by telephone at (617) 414-3658.