Hospitals, Language, and Culture

HLC Technical Advisory Panel

More than 20 experts serve or have served on the HLC study's Technical Advisory Panel (TAP) since 2003. Panelists represent a variety of demographic, geographic and professional backgrounds, with expertise in such areas as medical practice, health care research, medical anthropology, community health, hospital administration, public health, linguistics, and health policy. HLC staff complement TAP members’ contributions through consultation with other health care experts on an ad hoc basis.

The TAP is charged with assisting The Joint Commission in advising HLC staff in implementation of the grant, exploring issues critical to successfully serving patients’ cultural and language needs, identifying priority areas for the onsite review of hospitals, and developing recommendations that will inform the revision of cultural competency standards and survey process for accredited programs. The TAP is asked to consider the quality of care and safety issues relevant to cultural competency in different hospital settings; inform HLC research plans and results, communications initiatives, and dissemination plans; and consider the applicability of their recommendations within the current scientific, economic, and health care environment.

For more information on the Hospitals, Language, and Culture study or to sign up for the HLC list serve, contact us at hlc-info@jointcommission.org.

* Project Advisor
** Statistical Advisor

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Dennis P. Andrulis, PhD, MPH (TAP member 2003 – present)
Dennis P Andrulis, PhD, MPH, is Associate Dean for Research and Director for the Center for Health Equality at Drexel University. Dr. Andrulis was formerly a research professor at Downstate Medical Center Brooklyn where he oversaw projects, prepared major reports and published on issues affecting urban communities, the uninsured and other vulnerable populations. Recent work includes a book entitled Managed Care in the Inner City, creation of a cultural competence self-assessment tool for health care organizations, and a National Cultural competence conference series. He has also developed a compendium and analysis of national data sources on the nation’s 100 largest cities and their surrounding areas entitled The Social and Health Landscape of Urban and Suburban America.

Felicia Batts, MPH (TAP member and Project Advisor 2003 – present)
Felicia Batts, MPH, is the President and CEO of Consulting By Design. She has worked with national clients, such as the Health Resources and Services Administration conducting cultural competency training sessions and providing technical assistance to various HRSA grantees: area health education centers, community health centers, HIV/AIDS centers, maternal, child health programs, state health departments and various health care providers from around the country. Having worked in the private, public and nonprofit sectors, Ms. Batts specializes in the area of organizational cultural competency and has worked with federal and state clients to provide technical assistance and guidance for compliance with various regulatory requirements and accreditation standards relative to cultural competency. As part of the national Industry Collaboration Effort (ICE), Ms. Batts served as the founding chair for the Cultural and Linguistic Services Workgroup, where she was responsible for streamlining compliance with requirements from the Office of Civil Rights, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, California State Department of Health Services and others, for over 100 committee members.
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Ignatius Bau, JD (TAP member 2003 – present)
Ignatius Bau, JD, is Director of Culturally Competent Health Systems at The California Endowment. Prior to joining The Endowment, Mr. Bau served for in a number of capacities with the Asian and Pacific Islander American Health Forum. Other positions of note include adjunct faculty at the New College of California School of Law in San Francisco and staff attorney at the Lawyers’ Committee of Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area. Mr. Bau has served on numerous nonprofit, community-based organizations’ boards of directors and on a number of government committees and task forces. He also was a member of the Joint Commission Public Advisory Group, the National Quality Forum Work Group on Minority Healthcare Quality Measurement and Reporting, and several Technical Advisory Committees for the California Health Interview Survey. Mr. Bau was the lead author of A People Looking Forward: Action for Access and Partnerships in the 21st Century, the Interim Report of the President’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, has authored This Ground is Holy, a book on the sanctuary movement for Central American refugees, a chapter on immigration law in AIDS and the Law (Third Edition), and several articles in legal, health and public policy journals. Mr. Bau received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley (Phi Beta Kappa) and his law degree from the Boalt Hall School of Law at the University of California, Berkeley.

Marc L. Berk, PhD (TAP member 2003 – 2006)
Marc L. Berk, PhD, is a Vice President and Senior Fellow in NORC’s Health Studies Department and is an expert on surveys of physicians and medical offices with an outstanding record of pertinent research, project management experience, and government service. Dr. Berk served as Director of Project Hope’s Center for Health Affairs overseeing a large portfolio of health services research; he was Senior Sociologist at the National Center for Health Services Research, U.S Public Health Service where he supervised contractor performance on diverse elements of the National Medical Expenditure Survey and its predecessor, the National Medical Care Expenditure Survey. Dr. Berk began his research career at NORC, as an Assistant Survey Director. He received his Ph.D. in Sociology from New York University.
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Mary Lou Bond, PhD, RN (TAP member 2003 – present)
Mary Lou Bond, PhD, RN, is a George W. and Hazel M. Jay Professor in Nursing and the Interim Associate Dean of the Ph.D. in Nursing Program, and Director of The Center for Hispanic Studies in Nursing and Health at the University of Texas at Arlington. Dr. Bond has been involved with issues of language and culture since the mid-sixties when she lived and practiced nurse-midwifery in Central Mexico. Upon her return to the United States, she participated in a variety of activities to prepare health care workers for the delivery of culturally sensitive and competent care. In 1991 she developed and implemented a nursing elective course with a study abroad component (language and culture study) in Mexico. Dr. Bond subsequently designed a similar program for health professionals (The Travel Study Learn Program) and offers it twice a year as a continuing education program. Similarly, she offers a medical Spanish course for health professionals. She has served as a consultant on development of cultural competency to Parkland Health and Hospital System in Dallas, Texas.

Samuel Fager, MD, JD, MBA (TAP member 2003 – present)
Samuel Fager, MD, JD, MBA, is a former Surveyor with the Joint Commission. He graduated with an undergraduate degree in English from Princeton University and received his medical degree from Drexel University School of Medicine in Philadelphia, where he was elected to Alpha Omega Alpha. He then completed his residency training at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and at Columbia- Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. As a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar in the joint program at Stanford University and the University of California at San Francisco, he studied adolescent medicine and ambulatory care administration. In addition, he received a Master of Business Administration in Health Care Management at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in 1986 and graduated from Georgetown University Law School in 1997. Prior to joining the Joint Commission, Dr. Fager was the Director of Student Health and Counseling Services at the University of Pennsylvania and an Assistant Professor of Internal Medicine and Pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania’s Medical School. Subsequently, he was the Director of Pediatric Ambulatory Care, Director of Adolescent Medicine, and Director of Student Health at New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center and an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and Internal Medicine at Cornell Medical College. After becoming a surveyor, he was a Medical Director of Aetna in Hartford, Connecticut and a faculty member at the Yale University Medical School. He is a member of the staff of Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and is also the author of numerous scientific articles in infections disease and health care administration.
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Heng Lam Foong (TAP member 2003 – present)
Heng Lam Foong received her bachelor degree in Communication Arts in New York. After several years in print and broadcast media, Ms. Foong moved to Los Angeles and began her career in social services as the Program Director of SSG/PALS for Health Program, a private, non-profit program that provides health care interpretation, interpreter training, language proficiency testing, language access education, and language rights advocacy. Trained and guided by practical experience in policy work, Ms. Foong helped develop Los Angeles County’s first language rights campaign aimed at educating health care providers and limited-English proficient (LEP) individuals about their responsibilities and rights to linguistically appropriate health care under Dymally-Alatorre Bilingual Services Act and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Under her leadership, PALS for Health also partnered with four other statewide community agencies and clinics to develop the Connecting Worlds Training for Health Care Interpreters curriculum and an accompanying language proficiency testing for health care interpreters. Raised in a multilingual household, Ms. Foong passionately supports meaningful access to health care and is a member of Los Angeles County Department of Health Services’ Cultural and Linguistic Workgroup, Community Advisory Council for Care1st Health Plan, and a board member of the Los Angeles County Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.

Gregory A. Franklin, MHA (TAP member 2003 – 2006)
Gregory A. Franklin, MHA, is Deputy Director of Health Information and Strategic Planning for the California Department of Health Services. Mr. Franklin is responsible for the State’s Center for Health Statistics, Office of County Health Services, and the Department’s strategic planning activities. Prior to his current position he served as the Chief of the Department’s Office of Multicultural Health, responsible for the development and analysis of policies regarding the health of California’s communities of color. He has held key leadership positions in California’s Medi-Cal Managed Care program, the State’s Medically Indigent Services Program, and the Tuberculosis Control, and Refugee Health Program. Mr. Franklin is also the Governor’s appointee to the State’s Tobacco Education and Research Oversight Committee. He serves as part-time faculty at the University of Phoenix in their Health Sciences Program. Mr. Franklin is also a commissioned officer in the United States Air Force Reserves, working as a health administrator in large regional hospital. Mr. Franklin holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration with an emphasis in Strategic Management from California State University, Sacramento, and a Master of Healthcare Administration from Golden Gate University, San Francisco.
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Alexander R. Green, MD (TAP member 2003 – present)
Alexander R. Green, MD, is Senior Faculty at the Disparities Solutions Center at Massachusetts General Hospital and lecturer at Harvard Medical School. He received his Bachelor of Science and medical degree from the University of California, San Diego, and completed his residency training in internal medicine at the New York Hospital—Cornell Medical Center. Following residency, he joined the faculty at Cornell University dividing his time between resident teaching, clinical work in the culturally diverse community of Long Island City, and development and implementation of a curriculum in cross-cultural medicine. He served as Associate Director of the Primary Care Internal Medicine Residency Program at Cornell and Assistant Professor of Medicine, establishing an evidence-based medicine seminar series and a structured research curriculum for residents, and a patient education center. In 2005 he completed a mid-career research fellowship and Masters degree in Public Health at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard School of Public Health.

Louis Hampers, MD, MBA, FAAP (TAP member 2003 – present)
Louis Hampers, MD, MBA, FAAP, is the Section Chief of the Emergency Department of The Children’s Hospital of Denver and is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Colorado. His previous work on language barriers and emergency department resource utilization was funded by the Ambulatory Pediatric Association, and he received the Willis Wingert Best Paper Prize from the American Academy of Pediatrics in 1998. He also served on the project expert panel for the study of the impact of language barriers on health care costs and quality, sponsored by the Office of Minority Health. He currently serves as co-chair of the Ambulatory Pediatric Association Special Interest Group on Culture, Ethnicity and Health Care. His research has focused on the cost-effectiveness of professional interpreters and foreign language instruction for physicians. He is currently investigating the efficacy of telephonic medical interpretation in a randomized trial funded by The Children’s Hospital Research Institute.
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Romana Hasnain-Wynia, PhD (TAP member and Project Advisor 2003 – present)
Romana Hasnain-Wynia, PhD, is Director, Center for Healthcare Equity and Research Associate Professor at Northwestern University, Feinberg School of Medicine. Prior to joining Northwestern University, Romana was the Vice President of research for the Health Research and Educational Trust, the research and educational affiliate of the American Hospital Association. Romana is an expert in health care disparities research and serves as the principal investigator for a number of national studies examining use of patient demographic data in addressing disparities and improving health care quality for diverse populations. In addition, Romana is the Co-Principal Investigator of the project, Assessing the Impact of the CMS Pay for Performance Initiative (P4P) by Simulating Alternative Quality Scoring Methods. She serves on a number of national expert advisory panels and is currently a senior advisor to The Joint Commission project, Hospitals, Language and Culture: A Snapshot of the Nation and to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s national initiative to reduce disparities in cardiac care, Expecting Success: Excellence in Cardiac Care. Romana is Senior Associate Editor for the journal, Health Services Research.

Sandral Hullett, MD, MPH (TAP member 2003 – present)
Sandral Hullett, MD, MPH, is the Chief Executive Officer/Medical Director for the Jefferson Health System consisting of Cooper Green Hospital and Jefferson Outpatient Care. Jefferson Health System’s primary focus is service to the underserved populations of Jefferson County. Dr. Hullett was most recently Executive Director of Family HealthCare of Alabama, which is headquartered in Eutaw, Alabama, and provides services to patients of west central Alabama. A native of Birmingham, Alabama, Dr. Hullett earned her undergraduate degree in Biology at Alabama A&M University, her medical degree from the Medical College of Pennsylvania, and her Master of Public Health from the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). Since completing her residency in Family Practice and fulfilling a National Health Services Corporation obligation, she developed an interest in rural health care including health care planning and delivery to the underserved, underinsured, and poor of this area. Dr. Hullett has extensive experience in research, clinical trials, community outreach and teaching direct care delivery. She serves as project director and principle investigator for several grants funded by the National Cancer Institute, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, and the Ford Foundation. Dr. Hullett is the co-author of several nationally published articles on health care issues among rural primary care communities.
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Elizabeth Jacobs, MD, MPP (TAP member and Project Advisor 2003 – present)
Elizabeth Jacobs, MD, MPP, is a Clinician-Researcher and Assistant Professor of Medicine at John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital of Cook County and Rush Medical College. She trained as a general internist and completed a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Fellowship at the University of Chicago. After struggling to care for limited English-speaking patients during medical school and residency, she decided to pursue a research career investigating minority disparities in health care. As an RWJ fellow, she demonstrated that adequate interpreter services can reduce disparities in delivery of health care between English and non-English-speaking persons. Dr. Jacobs used this study to investigate the balance of costs and benefits of providing interpreter services. She recently completed the Language Barriers in Health Care Settings: An Annotated Bibliography of the Research Literature, funded by The California Endowment. She has been invited to serve on the Hablamos Juntos Scholar’s Network and several OMH advisory committees addressing the provision of interpreter services and culturally appropriate health care. She is the recipient of two grants from the National Cancer Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to study the relationship between general trust in physicians and health care institutions and its impact on cancer screening among minority men and women.

Lindsay K. Mann, MA, FACHE (TAP member 2003 – present)
Lindsay K. Mann, MA, FACHE, has been the Chief Executive Officer of the Kaweah Delta Health Care District since August 2001, was formerly Senior Vice President beginning in 1994. He served as Administrator for Visalia Community Hospital (now Community Health Center) between 1994 and 1996. Prior to that Mr. Mann served as Assistant Administrator and in other administrator capacities since 1981. He received his bachelors and masters degrees in Public Administration/Healthcare Administration from Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. Mr. Mann is a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives, a Board member of the Hospital Council of Northern and Central California, and a Board member of the Association of California Healthcare Districts. He has been involved with his local community as a member of Rotary, and is involved with Boy Scouts of America. Mr. Mann previously served as president of the Chamber of Commerce and as a member of Kiwanis.
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Edward L. Martinez, MS (TAP member 2003 – present)
Edward L. Martinez, MS, is currently a Health Management Consultant. In December of 2005, he retired from service as Assistant Vice President with the National Association of Public Hospitals and Health Systems (NAPH) in Washington, D.C., which represents over 100 public hospitals and health systems around the country. He was responsible for various projects that support the mission of the organization by assisting members in accessing resources for improving hospital and health system operations, and responding to the needs of culturally and linguistically diverse populations. Mr. Martinez has nearly thirty years of experience as a manager and executive in the public sector. Prior to his work with NAPH, he was Associate Director for Programs with the American International Health Alliance, a USAID-supported organization that manages health care partnerships between U.S. health care facilities and those in countries of the former Soviet Union and in Central and Eastern Europe. In addition, Mr. Martinez served over twenty-five years with the County of Los Angeles where he specialized in human resources management and hospital administration. He managed one of the largest public hospitals in the U.S. as executive director of Los Angeles County-University of Southern California Medical Center and held a key management position at Harbor-UCLA. Mr. Martinez received his Bachelor of Arts from St. John’s College in California, a Master of Science in Public Administration from California State University at Los Angeles, and completed National Association of Public Hospitals and Health Systems Fellowships in Healthcare Management and Policy at New York University and in Washington, D.C.

Adil Moiduddin, MPP (TAP member 2003 – 2006)
Adil Moiduddin, MPP, is a Project Manager at NORC with substantial experience conducting health services research for federal clients. Mr. Moiduddin currently manages the efforts of five professional staff and three NORC projects, including: an assessment of health information systems at community health centers, conducted for ASPE; a compilation of state bioterrorism and public health preparedness plans, for the Congressional Research Service; and an evaluation of policy implications of AHRQ’s low-income research portfolio. Mr. Moiduddin holds bachelor and master degrees in Public Policy from the University of Chicago. He began his career at The Lewin Group, where he led data collection and analysis tasks on a number of health studies, including an assessment of the impact of health system change on the nation's public health infrastructure and the first ever evaluation of HRSA's health care for the homeless (HCH) program using reduction in emergency room utilization as a key indicator. During the summer of 2000, Mr. Moiduddin served as a policy analyst within ASPE's Office of Health Policy, where he assisted HHS research staff in developing a process for assuring greater coordination of health care financing research across ASPE, AHRQ and CMS (then HCFA). He also assisted in the design of the ASPE-administered congressionally mandated evaluation of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).
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Sunita Mutha, MD (TAP member and Project Advisor 2003 – present)
Sunita Mutha, MD is an Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine and the Center for the Health Professions at the University of California, San Francisco. Her work focuses on educational and organizational approaches to addressing health disparities and improving the quality of care for diverse populations. In her recent projects focusing on assisting safety net hospitals, she collaboratively works to apply rapid cycle improvement methods to efforts to reduce cultural and linguistic barriers to care. She is the lead author of the nationally distributed curriculum, “Toward Culturally Competent Care: A Toolbox for Teaching Communication Strategies.” She has expertise in designing and presenting cultural competency programs for clinicians and frontline staff and is a frequent speaker on the topics of health disparities and cross-cultural care. Dr. Mutha completed her residency and chief residency at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, followed by a fellowship in the Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars program at Stanford University. A practicing general internist, she is also actively involved in educational activities for primary care residents and she has been the recipient of several teaching awards.

Guadalupe Pacheco, MSW (TAP member 2003 – present)
Guadalupe Pacheco, MSW, serves as a Public Health Advisor and Special Assistant to the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Minority Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Mr. Pacheco has occupied mid- and senior level management positions in state and Federal government agencies, as well as nonprofit organizations, focusing on health and human services program and policy issues. In his current capacity as Special Assistant to the Director for Minority Health, Mr. Pacheco is responsible for managing multiple projects that address health disparities of racial and ethnic minority communities. He staffs cultural competency activities through the Office of Minority Health’s Center for Linguistic and Cultural Competence in Health Care. Additionally, he staffs and coordinates initiatives and program activities that enhance service delivery to Hispanic Americans.
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Yolanda Partida, MSW, DPA (TAP member 2003 – present)
Yolanda Partida, MSW, DPA, is National Program Director for Hablamos Juntos, a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation initiative to develop practical solutions to language barriers in health care. Under her leadership Hablamos Juntos, located at the UCSF Fresno Center for Medical & Education Research in California, has become the premier national resource on language access and services. Dr. Partida has accumulated 30 years experience in public/teaching and private hospital administration, public health administration in the most populated US-Mexico border region and in private consulting. She has worked with The Lewin Group, a national health research, policy, and management consulting firm, and is the Founder and Executive Director for The Partida Group, a Latina-owned health policy, research, and management consulting firm specializing in diverse populations. In addition to her current work with Hablamos Juntos, Dr. Partida is a member of the Institute of Medicine Roundtable on Health Literacy; a board member of American College of Physician Foundation and of the National Hispanic Medical Association.  She is a fellow of the American Hospital Association Cultural Competence Leadership program and served on the IOM Committee on Communication for Behavior Change in the 21st Century, which published Speaking of Health: Assessing Health Communication Strategies for Diverse Populations.


Mark Rukavina, MBA (TAP member 2003 – present)
Mark Rukavina, MBA, is Executive Director of The Access Project, manages the overall operation of a national resource center serving communities in their efforts to address barriers to healthcare access. With more than 15 years of experience as a community organizer and healthcare policy advocate, he has worked with low-income membership organizations on strategic planning, communication, fundraising, and organizing techniques, and he has worked with grassroots groups in designing healthcare policy advocacy campaigns. Mr. Rukavina has also worked with healthcare institutions on efforts to link community-based organizations with health improvement efforts. Before joining The Access Project, Mr. Rukavina worked with several advocacy organizations, including the Massachusetts Senior Action Council, Health Care For All and, most recently, as Program Director for the Somerbridge Community Health Partnership in Somerville and Cambridge Massachusetts, where he managed a Community Care Network National Demonstration Program site supported by the American Hospital Association’s Hospital Research and Educational Trust.
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Karin Ruschke, MA (TAP member 2003 – present)
Karin Ruschke, MA, has dedicated her career to bridging language and cultural differences in the health care setting. As Founder and President of International Language Services, Ms. Ruschke directs the expansion of contract language interpretation services within the Chicago health care provider community. International Language Services is a full-service agency providing on-site and telephone interpretation, written translation services, and training to clients nationwide. Its mission is to help improve access to health care to limited-English-speaking communities. Ms. Ruschke is a member of the Board of Directors of the National Council on Interpretation in Health Care and co-chairs the Standards Training, and Certification (STC) Committee. In January 2004 the STC committee completed a National Code of Ethics for Interpreters in Health Care. They are currently working on creating National Standards of Practice for Interpreters in Health Care through a grant jointly funded by The Commonwealth Fund and The California Endowment. Ms. Ruschke also headed the Sub-Committee on Language Interpreting in the Medical Setting under the American Society of Testing and Materials (ASTM). Her publications include an article in The Alliance for Healthcare Strategy and Marketing titled Marketing to Ethnic Communities. A graduate of the University of Illinois with a Bachelor of Arts in German, Ms. Ruschke received her masters from the School of Translation at the Monterey Institute of International Studies in California.

Susan C. Scrimshaw, PhD (TAP member 2003 – present)
Susan C. Scrimshaw, PhD, was elected President of Simmons College in Boston, MA, in December of 2005. She previously served as Dean, School of Public Health, and Professor of Community Health Sciences and Anthropology at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She was Professor of Public Health and Anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles, from 1975-94 and Associate Dean for Academic Programs for the School of Public Health at UCLA from 1988-94. She was reared in Guatemala and has worked in many countries and cities, including Ecuador, Barbados, and Mexico; and New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago in the US; and has consulted on health programs in many more countries in Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. Dr. Scrimshaw earned her Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology from Columbia University.
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Craig Spivey, MSW (TAP member 2003 – present)
Craig Spivey, MSW, a Chicago native, has been in the field of social work for over 10 years working with troubled youth. He began his career as a student intern with Project Brotherhood, and was later hired as Medical Social Worker within Cook County Ambulatory Network. Currently, he holds the position of Director of Social Service within the leadership team of Project Brotherhood. Mr. Spivey is a member of the American Public Health Association. He received his Bachelor of Science from Southern Illinois University in Administration of Justice in 1991, and his Master of Social Work from University of Illinois, Jane Addams College of Social Work.

Gayle Tang, MSN, RN (TAP member 2003 – present)
Gayle Tang, MSN, RN, received her Bachelor of Science degree in Nursing from the University of San Francisco and her Master of Science degree in Nursing from Sonoma State University, with an emphasis on diversity and leadership. She has held positions ranging from hospital staff nurse to ambulatory care nurse manager, and now health plan administration. She founded and directed Kaiser Permanente’s first Multicultural Services Department and was appointed by her administration to lead the largest multiculturalism and diversity effort the San Francisco Medical Center had ever launched. In January 2001, Ms. Tang was appointed Director of National Linguistic and Cultural Programs, a newly-created position within Kaiser Permanente. Concerned with the dearth of trained health care interpreters and related patient safety issues, Ms. Tang developed and teaches a Health Care Interpreter Certificate Program with the goal of developing a cadre of linguistically and culturally competent healthcare interpreters. This Community College Partnership Program is in its seventh year and has been successfully replicated in California through funding from The California Endowment. Under Ms. Tang’s leadership, a national initiative co-funded by The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in its Building Community Health Care Interpreter Capacity program is currently underway. Ms. Tang is the Principal Investigator of several research projects assessing the quality of language access services, entitled Building Language Access Through Data Standards and Tools, a comprehensive research agenda funded by The California Endowment.
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Mara K. Youdelman, LLM, JD (TAP member 2003 – present)
Mara K. Youdelman, LLM, JD, has worked at the National Health Law Program (NHeLP) since August 2000 on issues including Medicaid, racial and ethnic disparities, data collection, reproductive health and immigrants’ issues. Ms. Youdelman is co-author of The Language Services Action Kit (with The Access Project) and NHeLP’s Ensuring Linguistic Access in Health Care Settings: Legal Rights and Responsibilities. She participates on a number of expert advisory panels examining language access issues including ones convened by the Office of Minority Health, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organizations, and the American Medical Association’s Ethical Force Program. Prior to joining NHeLP, Ms. Youdelman completed a teaching fellowship at Georgetown University Law Center’s Federal Legislation Clinic, and two years litigating for the Administration for Children’s Services in New York City on child abuse and neglect cases. She earned her law degree from the Boston University School of Law and her Master of Laws in Advocacy from Georgetown University Law Center.
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