DEAF-OWNED HEALTHCARE COMPLIANCE
Language access compliance, built to work in the real world.
Because when it doesn't, it becomes a legal, operational, and patient safety risk.
We design, build, and implement language access systems that ensure compliance is consistent across your organization, not dependent on individual staff decisions or institutional memory.
97%
more likely — Deaf ASL users are 97% more likely to use the emergency department than hearing patients, a direct consequence of communication access failures in primary care
71%
of physicians surveyed answered incorrectly about who determines reasonable accommodations under the ADA — in a national survey of 714 outpatient physicians
25/35
peer-reviewed studies on Deaf health outcomes document significant health inequalities compared to the general population — driven by access barriers, not audiological status
Most organizations don't realize these gaps exist until a complaint, audit, or patient harm brings them to light. These aren't just patient experience failures — they are legal and operational liabilities that are preventable with the right systems in place.
McKee, M. M., Winters, P. C., Sen, A., Zazove, P., & Fiscella, K. (2015). Emergency Department utilization among Deaf American Sign Language users. Disability and Health Journal, 8(4), 573–578. · Iezzoni, L. I., Rao, S. R., Ressalam, J., Bolcic-Jankovic, D., Agaronnik, N. D., Lagu, T., Pendo, E., & Campbell, E. G. (2022). US physicians' knowledge about the Americans with Disabilities Act and accommodation of patients with disability. Health Affairs, 41(1), 96–104. · Rogers, K. D., Rowlandson, A., Harkness, J., Shields, G., & Young, A. (2024). Health outcomes in Deaf signing populations: A systematic review. PLoS ONE, 19(4), e0298479.
WHY RAE & RAE
Compliance built from inside the Deaf community.
Most compliance consultants know the law. Not many have navigated a healthcare system as a Deaf patient, run clinical operations for a Deaf community, or sat at the table where state policy gets made.
Rae & Rae is founded and led by Alyssa Buchholz, a Deaf and native ASL user who spent years as COO of a national Deaf-led behavioral health organization, building the compliance infrastructure from the inside. She knows what breaks down in practice, because she's been in the rooms where it breaks down.
The work here isn't built from a legal framework and applied to a community. It's built from the community first.
Founder credentials
- Former COO, national Deaf-led behavioral health organization
- Built compliance infrastructure across clinical and operational teams
- Primary operational liaison, $3.6M NIH-funded clinical trial
- Clinical Specialist, The College of New Jersey
The systems we build aren't just compliant, they're usable, scalable, and defensible in real-world healthcare environments.
WHAT WE DO
We design, build, and implement language access systems — aligning policy, workflows, and staff behavior so compliance is consistent, defensible, and sustainable across your organization.
01
Assess
Identify where compliance breaks down across policies, workflows, documentation, and staff practices before it becomes a risk.
02
Build
Design defensible, audit-ready compliance infrastructure — Language Access Plans, communication protocols, accommodation frameworks, and the policies that hold them together.
03
Implement
Translate policy into practice, integrating systems across clinical, operations, HR, and administrative teams so compliance holds in the real world.
After working with Rae & Rae, your organization will have:
WHO WE WORK WITH
Built for healthcare organizations that serve Deaf, Hard of Hearing, and limited English proficient patients
If your organization is navigating language access compliance — at any stage — we can help.