Health & Disability Advocates (HDA) is a national organization, based in Chicago, Illinois, that uses multiple strategies to promote income security, work and education opportunities and improve healthcare access and services for children, people with disabilities and low-income, older adults. 2012 marks the 20th anniversary of the founding of our agency!
Our team of legal and policy experts provides a range of services including individual client services and legal representation, and customized trainings and technical assistance for a range of audiences, including consumers, service providers and state agencies. We develop innovative projects and policies to protect and strengthen federal and state safety-net programs including Supplemental Security Income (SSI), Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), Medicare and Medicaid. For more on current projects underway, visit Technical Assistance & Training, Innovative Program & Policy Work, or Client Services & Legal Representation.
Click here for our client portal.
What's New at HDA
HDA CEO and Think Beyond The Label co-founder Barb Otto featured in BusinessWeek's "A New Push to Hire the Disabled"
Illinois Health Matters launches "Neighborhood Stories" -- true tales of health care reform on the south and west sides of Chicago.
Just in time for back to school: CBS Chicago Channel 2 News featured a television interview with HDA and one of our clients about the recently passed Home Hospital Instruction Bill.
Bill protects children from losing ground in school during extended illness, disability. Gov. Quinn signed the Home/Hospital Instruction bill (HB1706) in July. HDA helped amend the Illinois School Code to clarify the law to ensure a student's ability to maintain his or her academic performance and standing during extending and intermitten medical absence and recovery periods. Previously, many school districts were delaying instruction and special services or not providing at all.
Report released on research required from Consent Decree in Memisovski v. Maram. A report on the ability of Illinois' Medicaid-insured children to access subspecialty medical care is now available online. This report includes recommendations to reduce the barriers that children in Cook County face in accessing health care. The full report is available here. The Executive Summary can be viewed here.
HDA Attorneys Receive Award from Illinois Maternal Health and Child Coalition. Programs and Policy Director Stephanie Altman, JD, and Amy Zimmerman, JD, Project Director of the Chicago Medical Legal Partnership for Children were honored for having made a significant impact on maternal and child health in Illinois. They received the annual Loretta Lacey Maternal and Child Health Advocacy Award from the Illinois Maternal and Child Health Coalition, the leading statewide organization working to guarantee the health, safety, and well-being, of infants, children, mothers, and families.
New Bill Provides Services to Kids whose Parents are Deployed. HDA helped draft legislation recently passed by the Illinois Legislature that offers students support services when they have relatives in the military who are deployed. It enables schools to ask their students at enrollment if they have parents or guardians in the military and if they have recently been deployed. This allows groups like the National Guard to come to the schools to provide services to those students. To learn more about the legislation, click here to read the May 31, 2011 Chicago Tribune story on House Bill 2870.
Online Library
View these recent additions to the Library, or search our entire collection.Illinois Connections for Families of the Fallen (ICFF) Brochure
This brochure describes the services available - including peer support and community resources - through Illinois Connections for Families of the Fallen (ICFF).
TBTL Fall 2011 Update Presentation
This presentation was used in the August 29th, 2011 webinar to update state partners on the latest developments for Think Beyond the Label.
Class Action Residual Fund Award Provides Key Support to Legal Aid
This press release from the Chicago Bar Foundation describes a cy pres award received by Health & Disability Advocates.
