Health Law Advocates, Inc.
30 Winter Street, Suite 1004
Boston, MA 02108
Ph: 617-338-5241
Fax: 617-338-5242
We are the only non-profit law firm in Massachusetts dedicated exclusively to health care access. With our parent organization, Health Care For All, HLA combines legal expertise with grassroots organizing and policy reform to advance the statewide movement for universal health care access. Health Law Advocates provides free legal assistance to hundreds of Massachusetts families each year.
Our clients are low and middle income residents from all parts of the State. Many are children, elderly, or coping with disabilities. All face barriers to health care treatment that result in suffering and loss. Last year, our small staff of full-time attorneys and private practice lawyers in our Pro Bono Legal Network panel combined to assist more than 850 families and individuals in obtaining access to needed health care. Day in and day out, HLA staff makes a difference in the lives of ordinary people who simply are unable to cut through legal, administrative or financial barriers to obtaining needed health care treatment.
- Tufts Medical Center: Tufts doctors will no longer accept Blue Cross Blue Shield HMO after Jan. 31
The unusual move carries enormous risks for Tufts as well as for patients, who may be faced with the difficult choice of changing insurance coverage or changing hospitals in the next few weeks. - HEALTH CARE REFORM Massachusetts as a Laboratory for Improving Access and Increasing Affordability
Friday, November 21, 2008 - Health Law Advocates co-sponsors and moderates a health reform conference at Suffolk University Law School that will explore the challenges confronted by Massachusetts in the initial implementation phase of the Commonwealth's ambitious health care reform program.
- Early diagnosis of children's mental health is key
The problems that plague children's mental health in Milford are the same statewide, with access and early diagnosis at the top of the list of issues discussed earlier this week at a brown-bag lunch. "Nationally we don't do well by our kids," said Barbara Anthony, executive director of the Boston-based Health Law Advocates. "We talk a good game, but our rhetoric doesn't match our results." - AG Investigates Boss' Failure To Pay Workers Health Insurance Premiums
Several employees showed original pay stubs to Team 5 Investigates, confirming that their bosses had been deducting the employees' contribution toward health care from paychecks until June 28, 2008, the day Winthrop Printing closed. It remains unclear where that money is now. "They're caught in the middle," said Barbara Anthony, executive director of Health Law Advocates, and former head of the consumer protection unit at the Massachusetts Attorney General's office. "They're totally innocent and they're just caught in the middle here." - Insurance for $30 a Month
Humana's Monogram plan, for instance, pairs its $30 premium with a staggering $7,500 deductible. Consumers who don't look past price per month may find themselves shelling out thousands more dollars down the line. "So many of these policies can be really shoddy," says Barbara Anthony, executive director of Health Law Advocates, a nonprofit law firm based in Boston. "Know up front what you're paying for." - Some Medical Debt May Be Avoidable in Massachusetts
Robert Peck, a motivational speaker from Greenfield, Mass., has relied on health insurance coverage his entire adult life. He says he paid $470 per month for his insurance, plus high deductibles whenever he needed more-than-routine care. But when Peck tested positive for a rare type of blood cancer, his insurance company refused to cover him when he needed the financial and health support the most.