Publications

Asian Health Services: Medical Assistants Improve Language Access and Patient-Centered Care

Author(s): 

Lisel Blash, Susan A. Chapman

Date: 
April 3, 2015

Asian Health Services (AHS) is an urban federally-qualified health center in Oakland, California. It has developed new roles for medical assistants and other frontline staff to capitalize on their language capacity and other skills to provide health coaching and health navigation services to an extremely diverse patient population with many different cultural and linguistic backgrounds.

Innovative Workforce Models of Health Care is a series of case studies showcasing primary care practices that are expanding the roles of medical assistants and other frontline workers in innovative ways. The organizations selected are implementing practice models that improve organizational viability and quality of care for patients while providing career development opportunities to frontline employees. This research is supported by theĀ The Hitachi Foundation.