April 2021 Meeting

Meeting Date
  • Access Info
  • Introductions
  • Council Business
    • Student Administrative Assistant coming on board soon
      • Hannah Lefton is officially hired as of this week
    • Call for participation: Neubacher Award Committee
      • Looking forward to fall semester
      • Main roles: review nominations and select a winner for this award
      • Question: Is there any thought to ensuring that the Neubacher committee has guidelines around majority participation of people with disabilities (specifically in regards to committee makeup)?
        • In 2019, award was reframed (both the award itself and how the committee is chosen)
        • Last year committee members had to fill out a survey with their interest and qualifications
    • Call for participation: Advisory Group
      • Reserved seats (for people representing specific disability organizations) are all filled
      • Created open seats so that council members who are interested but may not be formally representing another group can be involved
    • Call for participation: Fall program planning
      • Plan events around the month of October (Disability Community Month)
      • Programming will be in partnership with other disability orgs around campus
      • Likely going to be limited programming, similarly to last year
  • Invited Speakers about MiChart Accommodations Field
    • Clarissa Love, Office for Health Equity and Inclusion
    • Christa Moran, Michigan Medicine Interpreter Services
      • Interpreters are available and present throughout Michigan Medicine
      • Particularly helpful with building coalition and creating intersectional opportunities to ensure that needs are met by healthcare providers
      • Taking notice of intersectional needs, Christa and others realized that there were limitations to available resources. Patients had to re-request accommodations each time they came to the hospital
    • Now, each patient’s chart includes things like language and interpretation information, and this idea is being expanded to other parts of a patient chart to accommodate a variety of disabilities and needs.
      • 3-4 years of work to get here
      • Each accommodation is going to be identified by the patient, and can be inputted with the help of an RN/doctor, or individually by the patient alone.
        • See below for more information on how to input your information
      • MiChart wasn’t able to leave a fully open section for accommodation explanations, so some disability types and accommodations are already included in the system, and there is an “other” section for additional information
      • If an accommodation is unavailable for some reason (ie. a support cat cannot be legally brought into the clinic), practitioners will have a conversation with the patient about other options and/or how to have a successful and comfortable visit without that accommodation
    • Major Developments in MM
      • One major change in MM is going to be elevating concerns around disability issues to Dr. Runge
      • Working on increasing availability of adaptive sports
      • Elevating the deaf and hard of hearing community
      • Dr. Lisa Meeks is transitioning roles
    • Questions and Other Considerations
      • Will these accommodations be communicated to the front and exit desk staff?
        • Everyone has access to the information, and they will be trained to look for accommodations specifically
      • Assistive computer technology at MM doesn’t always work well with MiChart. Can the Accessibility team work on this?
        • Ideally yes, still a work in progress
      • How do we as healthcare consumers change our charts?
        • Questionnaire available through the patient portal, similar to the questionnaires for sexual orientation and gender identity
        • Reminders will be sent out twice a year, similarly to asks to update your insurance or address information
        • You can always update your needs in the portal as needed
      • Some clinics don’t have accessible scales and tables, and some clinics are not set up for appointments (ex. x-rays), so they may still not be accessible
        • This is the beginning of the conversation, and hopefully more can come out of this
        • Maybe a checklist for each clinic to see where to find each type of accommodation?
      • The preferred language among autistic people is “autistic,” not “person with autism” or “on the spectrum.”
  • Updates from Advisory Board and Council Members
    • GEO Disability Working Group is drafting a letter for Rackham in response to a report about disability accommodations process
      • Dean Solomon accepted the report and committed to some slow and non-ambitious goals in response
      • GEO Group is drafting a response, specifically about graduate students and employment processes, but want to ensure that the process is community-based
      • If you have any questions, suggestions, or considerations, email [email protected]
      • Once the letter is available, we have an opportunity for CfDC to see the letter, provide feedback, and potentially sign on
        • Signatures from CfDC are infrequent, historically, but we can consider that in the future. Individuals are welcome to sign on as well
  • Adjourn