Interprofessional Collaboration Between Law and Medicine: Opportunities for Health Equity Through Pathway Programs

Abstract – Medical-legal partnerships may be a means of improving health inequity in the United States by offering a unique approach to health disparities among vulnerable patient populations due to their integration of 2 professional perspectives and bidirectional sharing of knowledge. The clinical side of a medical-legal partnership develops patient relationships that allow for identification of this disparity, whereas the legal side settles the underlying structural and political circumstances. Medical-legal partnerships are a rapidly increasing interventional strategy, and modern programs have been implemented within undergraduate and graduate medical education as well as at the attending physician level, thus fulfilling educational competencies while simultaneously remedying health injustice for marginalized patient populations in need. Interprofessional teachings encourage cooperation and mutual respect between soon-to-be physicians and lawyers, with the intention of inspiring engagement in collaborations, such as medical-legal partnerships, once these students begin practice in their respective fields. However, such opportunities for cooperation can be introduced even earlier. To advocate for early implementation of medical-legal partnerships within the careers of future medical and legal professionals, the authors explored both interventional strategies used by existing programs across the United States and novel approaches introduced at Nova Southeastern University, namely, interprofessional debate-based electives for medical and law students as well as pathway programs targeted to underrepresented high school students. Such early exposure to medical-legal partnerships offers experiential learning for medical and law students while introducing high school students to concepts of health equity, thus instilling in them awareness of health determinants as well as confidence in their ability to create meaningful change as future health care and legal professionals.