{"id":11866,"date":"2022-06-02T15:36:29","date_gmt":"2022-06-02T15:36:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/?p=11866"},"modified":"2022-06-02T15:37:43","modified_gmt":"2022-06-02T15:37:43","slug":"east-boston-patients-urge-ag-to-investigate-and-reform","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/our-impact\/health-disparities\/east-boston-patients-urge-ag-to-investigate-and-reform\/","title":{"rendered":"East Boston Patients Urge AG to Investigate and Reform"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>As Investigations Into East Boston Neighborhood Health Center Continue, Community Demands Reforms To Stop Discriminatory, Substandard Care<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>MA Attorney General and Department of Public Health Investigating Harrowing Patient Reports Of Misdiagnosis, Delayed Care&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a <a href=\"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/English-EBNHC-Demand-Letter-6.2.22-FINAL.pdf\">letter<\/a> sent to the Massachusetts Attorney General and the Department of Public Health today,&nbsp;<strong>Lawyers for Civil Rights<\/strong>&nbsp;<strong>(LCR)<\/strong>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<strong>Centro Presente<\/strong>&nbsp;formally proposed reforms to rectify discriminatory and substandard medical care by the East Boston Neighborhood Health Center (EBNHC).&nbsp;&nbsp;EBNHC is under investigation based on&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/Letter-to-AGO-and-DPH-FINAL.pdf\">complaints<\/a>&nbsp;of discriminatory medical treatment of immigrants, particularly women and patients on MassHealth insurance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe have spent countless hours talking to affected community members about what reforms are needed at EBNHC,\u201d said&nbsp;<strong>Patricia Montes, Executive Director of Centro Presente<\/strong>.&nbsp;&nbsp;\u201cThe reforms we present today come directly from community members who have experienced the Health Center\u2019s failings firsthand.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Reforms detailed in the <a href=\"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/English-EBNHC-Demand-Letter-6.2.22-FINAL.pdf\">letter<\/a> include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Training&nbsp;\u2013 All EBNHC staff, from healthcare workers to administrative staff, should receive cultural-competency and trauma-informed care training, specifically relating to issues of gender-based violence and the root causes of migration from Central America.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li><li>Mental Health Services&nbsp;\u2013 EBNHC should increase mental health providers at EBNHC.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li><li>Immigrant Health Center&nbsp;\u2013 EBNHC should create a dedicated Center for Immigrant Health to provide culturally-competent, quality healthcare to the immigrant community.&nbsp;<\/li><li>Third-Party Review of Treatment Protocols&nbsp;\u2013 EBNHC\u2019s treatment protocols should be reviewed by outside experts and reformed to guard against misdiagnosis and substandard care.<\/li><li>Translation and Interpretation Services&nbsp;\u2013 EBNHC should improve its translation and interpretation services, to ensure that language does not stand as a barrier to quality healthcare. &nbsp;<\/li><li>Wait Times&nbsp;\u2013 EBNHC must reduce waiting times, especially for emergency room services.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The March 2022&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/Letter-to-AGO-and-DPH-FINAL.pdf\">complaint<\/a>&nbsp;that triggered the ongoing investigations by the Attorney General and the Department of Public Health documented substandard care by EBNHC \u2014 including failure to perform tests or lab work and misdiagnosis \u2014 that has resulted in worsened medical conditions, prolonged hospital stays, late diagnoses of cancer, and even death.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe reforms that the community proposes today are the minimum that is necessary for EBNHC to come into compliance with laws that forbid healthcare providers from discriminating on the basis of race, national origin, sex, or receipt of MassHealth insurance,\u201d said&nbsp;<strong>Mirian Albert, Staff Attorney of Lawyers for Civil Rights<\/strong>.&nbsp;&nbsp;\u201cWe are deeply grateful for the Attorney General\u2019s leadership in investigating EBNHC and hope that the reforms proposed today will provide a path forward to quality, non-discriminatory healthcare for all those whom the Health Center serves.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>EBNHC is the largest community health center in Massachusetts and one of the largest in the nation. The health clinic is the main access point for healthcare services for many individuals within Boston\u2019s immigrant communities.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Centro Presente and Lawyers for Civil Rights\u2019 letter proposing reforms is&nbsp;attached&nbsp;and can be found&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/English-EBNHC-Demand-Letter-6.2.22-FINAL.pdf\">here<\/a>.<\/em> Disponible <a href=\"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/Spanish-EBNHC-Demand-Letter-FINAL.pdf\">en espa\u00f1ol<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The original <a href=\"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/Letter-to-AGO-and-DPH-FINAL.pdf\">Request<\/a> for a Joint Investigation to the Attorney General and the Department of Health can be found\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/Letter-to-AGO-and-DPH-FINAL.pdf\">here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n<a href=\"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/English-EBNHC-Demand-Letter-6.2.22-FINAL.pdf\" class=\"pdfemb-viewer\" style=\"\" data-width=\"max\" data-height=\"max\" data-toolbar=\"bottom\" data-toolbar-fixed=\"off\">English-EBNHC-Demand-Letter-6.2.22-FINAL<\/a>\n<p class=\"wp-block-pdfemb-pdf-embedder-viewer\"><\/p>\n\n\n<a href=\"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/Spanish-EBNHC-Demand-Letter-FINAL.pdf\" class=\"pdfemb-viewer\" style=\"\" data-width=\"max\" data-height=\"max\" data-toolbar=\"bottom\" data-toolbar-fixed=\"off\">Spanish-EBNHC-Demand-Letter-FINAL<\/a>\n<p class=\"wp-block-pdfemb-pdf-embedder-viewer\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As Investigations Into East Boston Neighborhood Health Center Continue, Community Demands Reforms To Stop Discriminatory, Substandard Care MA Attorney General and Department of Public Health Investigating Harrowing Patient Reports Of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11866"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11866"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11866\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11870,"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11866\/revisions\/11870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lawyersforcivilrights.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}