Skip to main content
x

Our Story

Our mission is to create practical solutions at the intersection of vulnerability, migration, and health.

 

People across the US, when moving for new opportunities or because they have been displaced, often struggle to access our health care system because of language barriers, poverty, rural locations, unfamiliarity with their new community, and more.

 

Clinicians who serve these marginalized communities struggle to reach them, and lack the strategies, resources, and technical assistance to effectively remove barriers to ensure culturally relevant, linguistically appropriate, high-quality care is accessible.

Migrant Clinicians Network is transforming the health system to remove those barriers, connecting people who are moving and other marginalized communities with care, and bolstering the clinicians who serve them. MCN develops practical solutions to the biggest challenges in migrant and immigrant health, supporting both clinicians and migrants directly, through six primary avenues:

Virtual Case Management

MCN has a long history of providing training and technical assistance to all members of the health team who engage with patients to make sure that our clinicians can contribute to a resilient and effective health care system. MCN supports all aspects of the professional life of a migrant clinician, including:

  • First-of-its-kind Spanish-language learning collaboratives specifically for Community Health Workers.
  • Peer group support for clinicians experiencing work-related distress.
  • National webinars on critical clinical skills needed to effectively manage and treat underserved patients like people who are displaced, farmworkers, and other people who need to move.
  • Health center-wide technical assistance on how to support farmworkers.
  • In-person trainings for clinicians on pesticides and heat stress.
Virtual Case Management The US health care system is built for patients who are geographically stable, are integrated culturally and linguistically, and live close to care. For everyone else, there’s Health Network. MCN’s award-winning continuity of care program is for patients with ongoing health needs who have to move before their treatment is completed. Health Network is proven to be cost effective and to save lives. This important program ensures a stronger, more effective health care system that can respond to patients who would otherwise be lost to follow-up, delaying care and requiring more expensive and less effective care after their diseases have progressed. Since 1995, HN has served thousands of farmworkers, displaced people, and others moving within the US, or from the US to 120 other countries.
Virtual Case Management MCN is well known for its award-winning train-the-trainer curricula, ever-popular downloadable low-literacy comic books, and up-to-date, customizable materials addressing emerging issues from a clinician’s perspective.
Virtual Case Management MCN engages in numerous efforts to support hyper-local efforts to engage members of the community who are so often overlooked and marginalized, particularly when it comes to health. In Texas, MCN has partnered with the Ventanilla de Salud to expand access to culturally relevant health information, services, and screenings. In Maryland, MCN was active in supporting the Vulnerable Populations Task Force throughout the COVID pandemic, and then amplified the promising practices coming out of the task force through webinars and blog posts. In California, PhotoVoice is giving women and teens the opportunity to tell their stories through cameras. These are just some of the community engagement initiatives in which we are taking a lead.
  • Learn more about MCN’s partnership with three Ventanillas de Salud.

  • Read about the latest efforts of PhotoVoice.

Virtual Case Management MCN is proud of its Institutional Review Board – a rarity outside of academic spaces. Research teams can underestimate the importance of culturally competent approaches for migrant and immigrant research subjects. Since 1999, MCN’s IRB has ensured, in advance and by periodic review, that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect the rights, safety and welfare of human research subjects, particularly migrant farmworkers and other mobile, marginalized, and vulnerable populations. In 2021, MCN built an in-house evaluation team to better quantify and support programmatic efforts to train clinicians on issues of migrant health. MCN’s IRB and evaluation efforts are available to support external projects or research activities.
  • Learn more about and submit a protocol to MCN’s IRB.

  • For more information on MCN’s evaluation efforts, contact mcn@migrantclinician.org.

Virtual Case Management Health justice is at the center of everything that MCN does. MCN has actively advocated in several arenas to continue to support and strengthen our health care systems, support frontline clinicians, and improve and maintain the health of people who have to move, like farmworkers who move for work, or displaced people who move after a disaster. We have worked on improved occupational health and safety standards including updates to the Worker Protection Standard and national heat stress legislation, and clinical advocacy at international bodies including the United Nations on topics like tuberculosis.
  • Subscribe to MCN’s blog, in English and Spanish, to stay up to date on MCN’s advocacy efforts. 

  • Follow MCN on social media. 

Our Organization

Migrant Clinicians Network is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization. MCN has been awarded the Platinum Seal of Transparency, the highest level of recognition, from GuideStar/Candid, is a Top-Rated NonProfit according to GreatNonProfits, and has a score of 100 out of 100 from Charity Navigator.

GreatNonprofits Top Rated Badge

MCN is a global organization with more than 10,000 constituents. Our work is overseen by a Board of Directors comprised of frontline clinicians, researchers, policymakers, and academics with experience in and commitment to supporting thse at highest risk of health concerns. MCN employs a professional staff of about 50, based in offices or working remotely. Almost three-quarters of our staff is bilingual or multilingual and many come from immigrant and migrant families.

MCN equips clinicians, community health workers, and workers with comprehensive training and technical assistance that is culturally competent.  MCN advances language justice by offering educational webinars and written materials in both English and Spanish. Fostering an inclusive work environment starts by creating a safe space for all workers to ask questions, take risks, and be vulnerable with each other, this happens at MCN. 

MCN Staff and Board at the 2024 Strategic Planning Meeting.

Our Clinical Constituents

MCN serves a breadth of health professionals who provide care for migrants, immigrants, and asylum seekers, and other marginalized and underserved people. Roughly two-thirds of MCN’s constituency are clinicians providing direct health care to migrants.  The remaining third includes individuals whose efforts, all or in part, focus on migrant health. Slightly over 50 percent of MCN’s clinical constituents are based at community health centers.  The remainder are based in other sites including hospital emergency departments, private practice, health departments, research institutions, and educational institutions. Our focus on the multidisciplinary team includes resources and assistance specifically for community health workers or promotores de salud. MCN constituents are located throughout the US and include international health professionals with an interest in migrant health.

Our History

In 1984, three dedicated clinicians met at the Migrant Health Conference in Padre Island. The three clinicians -- Willa Hays, RN from Northwest Michigan Health Services, Inc.; Gail Stevens, RN from Delmarva Rural Ministries; and David Smith, then a physician at Brownsville Community Health Center -- shared a sense of personal isolation and dismay at the lack of migrant-specific resources available to clinicians. In 1985, they formed Migrant Clinicians Network, a grassroots clinical network consisting of clinicians dedicated to improved health care for people who, because they are moving, are at risk to be lost to follow-up.

 

MCN Impact Report

The report outlines MCN’s remarkable efforts to support underserved communities and the clinicians who work diligently to care for them.

Previous Impact Reports:
2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 20162015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 

Our Language

At Migrant Clinicians Network, we understand that language is constantly evolving as society and cultural values change. We strive to use language that celebrates the communities we serve, remains respectful, and mitigates the harmful impacts of bias. We routinely review our content and welcome feedback on our language use, updating it as needed.