From Patient Care to Advocacy, Dr. Emilee Dobish Is a Champion for Children

For Associate Professor Emilee Dobish, MD, caring for children goes beyond treating their illnesses in the clinic. Her work with the medical-legal partnership Memphis CHILD helps to remove legal and social barriers that can affect the health of patients.

Ever since Emilee Dobish, MD, was old enough to answer the question, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" she has known the answer.

Born with a diaphragmatic hernia, she spent her first days of life in the neonatal intensive care unit at Children's National Hospital in Washington, D.C.

"I was on ECMO (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation) at D.C. Children's, which was the fourth hospital in the country to get ECMO. I was the first one there with a diaphragmatic hernia to survive," Dr. Dobish said. "I feel like my purpose in life is to be a doctor; that's part of why I made it."

Her childhood experience led her to a career caring for children as a pediatrician at Le Bonheur Children's Hospital and associate professor at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center. She also advocates for the smallest and most vulnerable patients as the medical champion for the Memphis Children's Health Law Directive (Memphis CHILD), a medical-legal partnership that recently celebrated 10 years of serving families of Le Bonheur patients.

Finding Her Place

Originally from Maryland and a graduate of the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Dr. Dobish first joined UT Health Sciences and Le Bonheur in 2011 as a resident.

"I only applied for residencies in the South, just looking for somewhere new and for somewhere that didn't have winter, or at least as much winter as I was used to," she said. "I didn't know anything about UT Health Science Center, but when I got here, everybody was so kind and cared so much about taking care of each other and taking care of the kids. It felt like such a friendly, positive organization."

Dr. Dobish planned on working in the NICU until her third year as a resident. "I felt more connected to caring for these babies and better suited to advocate for them after they had graduated from the NICU, so I made a last-minute switch to hospital medicine," she said.

After completing residency, including a year as chief resident, she realized how much she valued the experience and chose to stay on as faculty.

"I thought this program gave me some of the best training. I was given a lot of supervised autonomy, and it made me grow as a person and as a doctor," she said. "I wanted to keep that tradition going and become one of the attendings to give that to the next generation, so that they could feel what I felt as they are training."

Dr. Dobish joined the faculty in 2015, first as assistant professor and then as associate professor since 2024. In 2020, she became the associate program director of the Pediatrics Residency.

"I feel really connected to these kids, and I think my passion for caring for them helps teach the residents and medical students that it's fun to care for these kids and that they're not just a list of all of their diagnoses," she said.

One of Dr. Dobish's proudest moments at Le Bonheur came as a first-year attending, when she was part of the team that separated conjoined twins.

"I was their attending pediatrician while they were in the hospital, so I got to sit in on all the surgery meetings and was one of the ones helping coordinate rehab with surgery and talking about what all they would need to get healthy for surgery. I got to be with the family through that whole journey," she said. "That was really amazing. I don't know if I'll do something like that again."

While she refers to that as one of her peak patient care experiences, Dr. Dobish also values the day-to-day care she provides with the Le Bonheur team. "What I like about Le Bonheur is that everybody really cares about the child," she said. "Everybody goes out of their way to try and make these kids' lives better."

Caring Beyond the Clinic

Alongside her clinical work, Dr. Dobish channels her passion for improving children's lives into her role as medical champion for Memphis CHILD, a medical-legal partnership that provides low-income families in Shelby County free assistance with civil legal matters affecting the health or well-being of Le Bonheur patients.

Comprised of UT Health Sciences, Le Bonheur, the University of Memphis Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law, Memphis Area Legal Services, and West Tennessee Legal Services, the partnership has made nearly 4,000 referrals since it began in 2015. It provides more than half a million dollars in free legal services each year, with most cases dealing with Supplementary Security Income (SSI) benefits, education concerns, housing issues, conservatorships, and family law.

Memphis CHILD was the first medical-legal partnership of its kind in the region and is one of the most robust in the country. For the Memphis community, the profound impact of the partnership reflects the great need, especially among families with few resources.

"The majority of Le Bonheur patients are Medicaid patients or have no insurance and are living in low-income housing," Dr. Dobish said. "We know that families living in low-income housing have at least two to three unmet civil legal needs, so being able to have access to someone who can advocate for you and help make sure your housing conditions are safe, that's essential for kids so they can grow and develop to reach their full potential."

As medical champion, Dr. Dobish serves as a liaison between the lawyers and medical providers. She also works to educate physicians, medical staff, and case managers at Le Bonheur about the issues facing patients' families, and she helps the attorneys understand the medical aspect of the cases.

"We meet once a week and review every referral that has come in," she said. "I present the medical aspect of the case and how the legal issue could affect the patient's health."

"When you can put a face to the name, I think it just becomes that much more impactful."

Dr. Emilee Dobish

UT Health Science Center residents at Le Bonheur can get involved with Memphis CHILD in several ways. Dr. Dobish helps run an elective for pediatric residents in which they work with University of Memphis law students to find solutions for clients, learn about Individualized Education Programs (IEP) by attending meetings with a special education advocate, and see firsthand how eviction cases work by attending court hearings.

Residents can also get involved by working in Le Bonheur's SSI clinic, which was started after a resident who took the Memphis CHILD elective noticed a need for it. In the clinic, residents assist clients with the medical portion of their disability reports for SSI applications. This gives the residents a better understanding of both the barriers patients encounter in accessing resources and the implications of medical documentation outside of direct patient care. In turn, the clients are able to submit more accurate applications with a higher chance of approval.

"It's one thing to have a theoretical understanding of what our patients are facing while living in these low-income, under-resourced areas, but to be with the clients one-on-one and learn about what these housing conditions are really like, what the landlords are really like, how hard the families are fighting to get IEP and other support for their kids at school - when you can put a face to the name, I think it just becomes that much more impactful," Dr. Dobish said.

Reaching Further

Looking toward the future, Dr. Dobish hopes to expand opportunities for medical students to get involved in Memphis CHILD. "I think it's really unique and really important for medical education," she said.

Dr. Dobish is deeply aware that medicine alone cannot solve all the problems facing her young patients. However, she is comforted by her belief that Memphis CHILD is making a positive difference for families in need, thanks to the partners' dedication to fighting for children.

"The health of children in Memphis and Shelby County is so important, and what I do as a doctor is probably only covering about 20% of their health," she said. "If I can find a way as a doctor to tap into resources to address the other 80% of their issues, I'm going to make kids healthier, and healthier kids become healthier adults."

Memphis CHILD is primarily funded by grants and donors. Please make a gift to support Memphis CHILD's work in celebration of its 10-year anniversary.