Improving access to psychological therapies in prisons

Forrester, Andrew; Maclennan, Frances; Slade, Karen; Brown, Penelope; Exworthy, Tim

doi:10.1002/cbm.1898

Cited by 13 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…They reinforce the need for prison to be a positive, health-promoting setting and for low-threshold, timely access to psychological therapies for those who experience difficulties. 18 , 42 …”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mental wellbeing among people in prison in Scotland: an analysis of repeat cross-sectional surveys

Tweed

Gounari

Graham

2019

Journal of Public Health

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Background Mental wellbeing among people in prison is poorly studied, despite featuring in many health and justice policies. We aimed to describe for the first time mental wellbeing among an unselected national prison sample. Methods Since 2013, the Scottish Prisoner Survey—a biennial survey of people in custody in Scotland—has included the Warwick-Edinburgh mental wellbeing scale (WEMWBS), a 14-item scale with higher scores indicating greater wellbeing. We analysed data from sweeps in 2013 (n = 3158), 2015 (n = 2892) and 2017 (n = 2405) using Student’s t-test, ANOVA and multiple linear regression. We also used WEMWBS data from the Scottish Health Survey stratified by age, gender and deprivation to compare with the population at liberty. Results Mean WEMWBS scores overall were 43.4 in 2013 (SD = 12.2), 41.8 (SD = 11.9) in 2015 and 41.2 (SD = 12.3) in 2017. Mean scores were lower among people on remand and with multiple prison episodes. Age-standardized mean scores were lower among people in prison than their peers at liberty. Conclusions Poor mental wellbeing is an important, under-studied facet of the extreme health inequalities associated with imprisonment. These results identify that people on remand or with multiple episodes are particularly disadvantaged and provide a baseline for monitoring impacts of service or policy interventions.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mental wellbeing among people in prison in Scotland: an analysis of repeat cross-sectional surveys

Tweed

Gounari

Graham

2019

Journal of Public Health

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“…Referrals to the mental health in-reach team during an 18-week period in 2008 (Forrester et al, 2014) were compared with referrals during a 16-week period in 2011. Prison healthcare records (including reception screens, initial assessments and subsequent psychiatric and case management entries contained within the prison's electronic healthcare records) were also reviewed to collate information on a range of demographic, forensic and clinical variables.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Despite these initial problems, prison mental health in-reach services have generally been welcomed as a useful vehicle for managing prisoners presenting with mental health problems (Samele, Forrester, Urquia, & Hopkin, 2016), and greater levels of integration with primary care and forensic psychology services have been seen as beneficial (Forrester, MacLennan, Slade, Brown, & Exworthy, 2014). Yet although the introduction of these services has also coincided with improvements in national arrangements for prison health screening, many prisoners with SMI have remained unidentified during their time in prison (Birmingham, Gray, Mason, & Grubin, 2000;Senior et al, 2013).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Prison Mental Health In-reach: The Effect of Open Referral Pathways

Hopkin

Samele

Singh

et al. 2016

Psychiatry, Psychology and Law

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In England and Wales, mental health in-reach teams manage high levels of mental disorder in prisons, but problems with reception screening and referral triage have been identified. As one potential solution, we examined the effect of an open referral pathway upon one in-reach team by evaluating its referrals and caseload across two time periods (in 2008 and 2011). There was a doubling of team referrals (from 101 to 203) with significantly improved identification of people with no mental health history. There was further evidence for a lowering of thresholds for referral and assessment, an approach that can be seen as helpful within a system that is known to under-identify mental health problems. Despite limitations, this evaluation offers some evidence for the effectiveness of open referral systems. It also raises questions about the potential effects of liaison and diversion services that are presently being piloted for national introduction.

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“…Inclusion in an offender programme is based on risk, targeting offendersÕ criminogenic needs (Andrews & Dowden, 2006), as opposed to the individually tailored treatment of mental health. Although there is a high prevalence of mental health problems among offenders (Singleton et al, 1998), mental health treatment services and offence based work have tended to sit separately (Forrester, MacLennan, Slade, Brown, & Exworthy, 2014).…”

Section: Current Mental Health Provisionmentioning

confidence: 99%