title: The legal clinic: helping social workers master the legal environment in health care.
abstract: The social environment for all is becoming increasingly legalized. This fact is evidenced in the extensive entitlement regulations and ethical decision-making processes surrounding health care consumers and professional providers. The authors of this paper describe a program designed to educate social workers in an acute care hospital to the legal issues and considerations that influence decision-making and interventions in social work practice. The purpose of the paper is two-fold: to highlight the program planning process in establishing and institutionalizing a Legal Clinic for social work, and secondly to stress the significance of legal content in the knowledge base of social workers in health care settings.
authors.affiliation: Department of Social Work Services, Mount Sinai Hospital, New York, NY 10029.
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Blumenfield
authors.forename: E P
authors.initials: EP
authors.lastname: Simon
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Bennett
mesh_terms: D004496:Education, Continuing / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000592:standards; D006784:Hospitals, Teaching; D006786:Hospitals, Urban; D006801:Humans; D009937:Organizational Objectives; D010934:Planning Techniques; D016730:Program Development; D012946:Social Welfare / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D012947:Social Work / Q000193:education*; D012948:Social Work Department, Hospital / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*