Center for Immigrant Health

The interdisciplinary MGH Center for Immigrant Health (CIH) fosters excellence in clinical care, education, advocacy and research to improve the health and wellbeing of immigrants, across all departments and clinical sites at MGH and within the broader community. The Center’s programming serves the needs of both immigrant patients and staff.

• Resource development and navigation. The MGH CIH provides outreach and guidance to help immigrant patients, staff, and their families navigate access to hospital and community resources, including medical, dental, insurance, legal, educational, housing, nutrition, and interpretation services.
• Clinical programming. The MGH CIH clinical team includes expertise in internal medicine, pediatrics, psychiatry, emergency medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, and social work. The Center develops mental health programming to address resettlement and acculturation stressors as well as the trauma and isolation experienced by some members of the immigrant community. The Center also developed culturally informed nutrition programming to address food insecurity and risk factors for obesity.
• Education. The MGH CIH collaborates with experts in immigrant and refugee health to develop and disseminate best practices in caring for immigrant patients through educational modules for staff and clinical electives for students and residents.
• Quality improvement and research. The MGH CIH seeks to identify opportunities to improve the quality of clinical care for patients who speak languages other than English, and to study factors that affect immigrant health outcomes.