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Medical-Legal Partnership Clinic

New for Spring 2026, Saint Louis University’s Medical-Legal Partnership Clinic, a joint venture with the Legal Clinics, Center for Health Law Studies and SLU School of Medicine, is launching a partnership with SSM Health Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital.

In the Medical-Legal Partnership Clinic, SLU LAW students will integrate into health care teams to collaboratively address patients’ health-harming legal needs. Medical-legal partnerships integrate lawyers into health care teams to collaboratively address patients’ health-harming legal needs.  For example, a child with asthma who lives in substandard rental housing may need a lawyer's help to persuade the family's landlord to deal effectively with a mouse or mold problem that is exacerbating the child's asthma. Without the legal "treatment," it may be impossible for the child to be healthy, no matter what the pediatrician does medically.

Working closely with Cardinal Glennon providers, students in this clinic will take the lead lawyering roles in a variety of legal work supporting good health for St. Louis area children and their families. This "patients to policy" mission will involve:

  • Representing individual patient-families in a range of civil legal matters, including housing, education, public benefits and/or family law;
  • Responding to doctors, nurses, social workers, and other providers' questions about the law and the legal system;
  • Engaging in interprofessional education with physicians who are in their pediatric residency training; and
  • Advocating with decision-makers to change laws and policies that affect population health.