Family and Medical Leave: Law, Health Care, and Social Services
Course #91012 - $30 -
- Participation Instructions
- Review the course material online or in print.
- Complete the course evaluation.
- Review your Transcript to view and print your Certificate of Completion. Your date of completion will be the date (Pacific Time) the course was electronically submitted for credit, with no exceptions. Partial credit is not available.
Family and medical leave law, including both federal and state instruments, constitutes one of a handful of areas in which law typically cannot operate in practice without the direct participation of healthcare practitioners, inclusive of medical and mental health clinicians. This course will review the clinical and social benefits of leave-taking, as well as options and information about the choices clinicians can make to support leave-taking where needed and to properly direct and refer clients who need more specific legal guidance than clinicians are in a position to provide.
- INTRODUCTION
- FORMS OF LEAVE-TAKING AVAILABLE IN THE UNITED STATES
- LEAVE-TAKING AS A VITAL HEALTH, COMMUNITY, AND ECONOMIC RESOURCE
- LEGAL RIGHTS OF WORKERS TO TAKE LEAVE
- THE ROLE OF HEALTHCARE AND SOCIAL SERVICE PROVIDERS IN ENSURING ACCESS TO LEAVE
- DEVELOPMENTS IN LAW AND POLICY
- RESOURCES
- CONCLUSION
- APPENDIX
- Works Cited
This course is designed for all physicians, physician assistants, nurses, social workers, counselors, and allied healthcare professionals with patients who require or would benefit from protected leaves of absence.
The purpose of this course is to provide healthcare professionals with the information necessary to guide patients and make clinical decisions regarding the needs for an extended leave from work.
Upon completion of this course, you should be able to:
- Outline the types of leave available in the United States.
- Describe the impact of leave-taking on individual, family, and community health.
- Identify common obstacles to leave-taking.
- Discuss the legal rights of workers to take leave.
- Analyze the role of healthcare and social service providers in ensuring access to leave.
Beth Ribet, PhD, JD, is the co-founder and co-director of Repair, a health and disability justice organization. Dr. Ribet obtained her doctorate in Social Relations (Sociology & Anthropology) from the University of California-Irvine, and her law degree at UCLA, with a specialization in Critical Race Studies. Her areas of expertise include disability and employment, disability civil rights, medical sociology, healthcare advocacy, and social psychology. Her particular research and teaching interests focus on the production of new disabilities and illnesses as a result of violence, exploitation, and inequity and strategies for using law and policy to address the concerns of people disabled or injured by inequity. Dr. Ribet speaks publicly and trains healthcare, legal, and social service practitioners regarding work with vulnerable populations, including but not limited to trafficked and exploited persons, refugees, incarcerated persons, and children and youth with disabilities.
Leslie Bunnage, PhD, is an associate professor of sociology and director of the Lewinson Center for the Study of Labor, Inequality & Social Justice at Seton Hall University. Her research falls within the two main areas of social movement mobilization and strategic formation and labor and inequalities. Her recent projects include an analysis of Internet communication technology as a basis for cohering social movement organization (SMO) messaging and strengthening collective identity (with Deana Rohlinger), and a qualitative study of dehistoricization and rhetoric in the U.S. Tea Party movement. Dr. Bunnage also examines labor movement revitalization and intersectional racial, gender, and socioeconomic barriers to leadership development in the AFL-CIO “Union Summer” youth training program. She is currently developing a socio-legal research agenda examining the impact of family and medical leave law and policy on the materialization of workers’ rights.
Lisa Concoff Kronbeck, JD, graduated from UCLA School of Law in June 2010 and was admitted to the California State Bar later that year. She also holds a master's degree in public policy from the UCLA School of Public Affairs, with a concentration in health and social policy. Following law school, Ms. Concoff Kronbeck worked for two years as a staff attorney in the public benefits unit at Disability Rights California, assisting clients primarily with benefits linked to disability, including Medi-Cal, Supplemental Security Income, Social Security Disability Insurance, and In-Home Supportive Services. At present, she is caring for her tiniest client thus far: her young daughter who has Down syndrome.
Contributing faculty, Beth Ribet, PhD, JD, has disclosed no relevant financial relationship with any product manufacturer or service provider mentioned.
Contributing faculty, Leslie Bunnage, PhD, has disclosed no relevant financial relationship with any product manufacturer or service provider mentioned.
Contributing faculty, Lisa Concoff Kronbeck, JD, has disclosed no relevant financial relationship with any product manufacturer or service provider mentioned.
John M. Leonard, MD
Jane C. Norman, RN, MSN, CNE, PhD
Alice Yick Flanagan, PhD, MSW
The division planners have disclosed no relevant financial relationship with any product manufacturer or service provider mentioned.
Sarah Campbell
The Director of Development and Academic Affairs has disclosed no relevant financial relationship with any product manufacturer or service provider mentioned.
The purpose of NetCE is to provide challenging curricula to assist healthcare professionals to raise their levels of expertise while fulfilling their continuing education requirements, thereby improving the quality of healthcare.
Our contributing faculty members have taken care to ensure that the information and recommendations are accurate and compatible with the standards generally accepted at the time of publication. The publisher disclaims any liability, loss or damage incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly, of the use and application of any of the contents. Participants are cautioned about the potential risk of using limited knowledge when integrating new techniques into practice.
It is the policy of NetCE not to accept commercial support. Furthermore, commercial interests are prohibited from distributing or providing access to this activity to learners.
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The role of implicit biases on healthcare outcomes has become a concern, as there is some evidence that implicit biases contribute to health disparities, professionals' attitudes toward and interactions with patients, quality of care, diagnoses, and treatment decisions. This may produce differences in help-seeking, diagnoses, and ultimately treatments and interventions. Implicit biases may also unwittingly produce professional behaviors, attitudes, and interactions that reduce patients' trust and comfort with their provider, leading to earlier termination of visits and/or reduced adherence and follow-up. Disadvantaged groups are marginalized in the healthcare system and vulnerable on multiple levels; health professionals' implicit biases can further exacerbate these existing disadvantages.
Interventions or strategies designed to reduce implicit bias may be categorized as change-based or control-based. Change-based interventions focus on reducing or changing cognitive associations underlying implicit biases. These interventions might include challenging stereotypes. Conversely, control-based interventions involve reducing the effects of the implicit bias on the individual's behaviors. These strategies include increasing awareness of biased thoughts and responses. The two types of interventions are not mutually exclusive and may be used synergistically.