Dementia Behind Bars

In the world, changes need to be made. Some people dedicate their lives to improving the world and making it a better place. In the early 1800s, one woman decided that the prison and mental health systems could be improved to be kinder and more effective institutions. She saw a change to be complete in the world and made it her task to recreate the prison and mental health systems in a new and superior style. Throughout the years, prisons and mental health asylums have changed greatly, especially concerning unfair prison treatment, the reform movement, and today’s important impact.

Over the last thirty years the number individuals held in the United States Prison system has been growing rapidly. Numerous studies have found that the prison population that is growing most rapidly is the elderly population. For the purposes of this paper, the term aging and elderly population will refer to those who are incarcerated and are over the age of 61. As the number of elderly inmates continues to increase the number of stressors put on both the correctional system and the individual. In general, the correctional system faces a significant amount of financial stress in attempting to care for aging inmates, where as the inmates themselves face more emotional and physical stressors of aging, chronic illnesses, and even dying in prison. This paper aims to examine the stressors faced by the system and the individuals, as well as alternative options to continuing the incarceration of aging and elderly individuals.

The graying of the nation’s inmates is also an issue which continues to swell the cost of health care within the prison. According to the Pew Center, “…between 1992 and 2001, the number of state and federal inmates aged 50 or older rose from 41,586 to 113,358.” Older inmates are gradually making up a larger proportion of the overall count. While one may say that aging decreases criminal activity, such as those that result from communicable diseases mentioned from the previous paragraph, there are many more factors that should be considered. One problem is that older inmates are often preyed upon by younger, stronger inmates; therefore, older inmates may require special housing. Hearing and visual

[In an effort to reduce crime rates over the last two decades, there was a push to increase arrests, and length of incarceration of criminal offenders. Due to the increase in numbers of offenders incarcerated and the length of their sentences the prison has an increasing population of elderly offenders. In light of this situation, the need to provide medical care for this population has become increasingly more expensive than anyone anticipated. Therefore, there has been a great deal of attention to what is known as compassionate release. In order to evaluate the arguments for and against this legislation we will look at the arguments on both sides, what values underlie each position, how medical release fits into the discussion, and alternatives to the problem.

A great study conducted by Dr. Williams consisted of gathering workers in the prisons who worked with elderly inmates: 29 experts where chosen of which 19 were men and 10 were women. The goal and purpose of the study was to find a possible solution to help

The problem with privatization is that the company profits and benefits from the more people incarcerated. Although private prisons do save money, many concerns have been voiced regarding their levels of safety and effectiveness at cutting costs compared to prisons run by the government. In reality, private prisons are deteriorating the conditions of prison health care because they are willing to go to extreme lengths in efforts to save money, which in the end only benefits them. The inmate co-payment system has been implemented to reduce “the amount of doctors’ hours, supplies, and visits to an already overloaded service provider since co-payment systems serve as a rationing device” (Wallace 281). The problem with the co-payment system arises in the inmates’ future because the inmate at times is released from prison only to encounter a medical bill of debt issued from the prison itself, which causes the inmate to struggle financially and not be able to afford medical care in the real world. This leads to a sick population of inmates released from prison who cannot afford medical care on their own, which then falls into the responsibility of the government to provide Medicaid for them, causing the government to spend money on inmates that could have been prevented in

For all family members and support workers it is quite common to feel guilty - guilty for the way the person with dementia was treated in the past, guilty at feeling embarrassed by their odd behaviour, guilty for lost tempers or guilty for not wanting the responsibility of caring for a person with dementia. If the person with dementia goes into hospital or residential care you may feel guilty that you have not kept him at home for longer, even though everything that could be done has been done. It is common to feel guilty about past promises such as " i'll always look after you" when this cannot be met.

The general public does not agree with the way correctional services are handling the elderly offender population. Not only are elderly prisoners more expensive to keep incarcerated than the average prisoner, they also pose little to no threat to society. Yet the elderly prison population is increasing due to the stricter sentences implemented during the 1980s and 1990s known as “tough on crime” and “war on drugs” policies. Many of these questions arise in the public’s mind whenever this topic is

In order to effectively address the rising issue of mental health cost of the aging inmate population the federal and state government needs to explore other avenues that will effectively promote and demonstrate adequate services and care for those inmates in need of special mental health care provisions.

As a result of the implementation of mandatory sentencing polices and get tough on crime laws that began in the 1970s, dementia has become just one of the rising age-related infirmities that has plagued the growing aging prison population, drastically increasing prison cost for these individuals. The New York Times editors argue that in order to address the rising caseload of aging inmates in need of mental health care “states must pursue other avenues.” They suggest that states “foster partnerships between prisons and nursing homes to improve the quality of care; consider compassionate release programs for frail inmates who no longer present a threat to public safety; and, no less important, revisit the mandatory sentencing policies that did away with judicial discretion and filled the prisons to bursting in the first place” (“Dementia Behind Bars,” 2012).

Because the prison system has been an environment where for many years most of the inmates are in the range between 20 to 40 years old the system is constructed to deal with inmates that are around these ages. But due to the recent large increase among the elderly inmates, society has taken notice of some of the issues that the elderly have to deal with when they are incarcerated. According to the report by Tia Gubler (2006) the amount of elderly inmates has increased 750 percent in the last 20 years. This drastic change makes it harder for the prisons to adjust their regulations and procedures therefore leaving the elderly with no choice but to adapt to these type of restraints. She also highlights some of the most common issues that the elderlies

There has been a comprehensive psychological program that has been developed for a prison in California that is meant for Inmates with Dementia (Hodel, 2013). The program is called Special Needs Program for Inmate-Patient with Dementia (SNPID). The program provides support from other inmates to those who have dementia. The Special Needs Program for Inmate-Patient with Dementia was only put in order because there was a major lawsuit that was filed because on an inmate-patient that had cognitive impairments (Hodel, 2013). That lawsuit is known as the Clark verses The State of California in 1997 (Hodel, 2013). Because of that case, the California prison system has to provide inmates with cognitive impairments with safe housing, supportive services

. . in 1988, the United States spent about $11 billion on the entire corrections system. Today, we spend about $16 billion annually on the aging prisoner population alone.” (Chettiar and Gupta). However, there is a way to solve these problems. By the time a prisoner turns 50, the likelihood of that prisoner committing another crime has dropped immensely. Only 16.9% of prisoners released at age 45 and older return for new sentences. There are a few policies that can further help solving the issue such as: 1) Granting conditional release for aging prisoners who pose little safety risk; 2) Utilizing and expanding medical parole; or 3) Reauthorizing and expanding aging prisoner release programs. (Criminal Justice Degree Hub). If these policies are implemented, states could save an average of $66,294 every year for each released aging prisoner, which accounts for increased parole, housing and public benefits costs. The difference between the annual cost savings of releasing the average aging prisoner versus keeping them behind bars ranges from $28,362 to

2) The Real Careers segment with Isaac Torres on page 317 of our course reading helped me to remember another progression that would decrease the jail populace and accompany different advantages when he discussed the high number of rationally sick detainees he manages. Since psychological wellness offices were extremely de-subsidized, and many were compelled to close, under Governor Reagan, extensively more prominent quantities of rationally sick people wound up either in jail or as a major aspect of the destitute populace - which additionally made an antagonistic social disgrace about vagrants being insane. In this way, another answer for the issue of congestion in penitentiaries and prisons, notwithstanding the others said, is reestablish huge financing and assets to mental medicinal

Privatizing prisons may be one way for the prison population to get back under control. Prisons are overcrowded and need extra money to house inmates or to build a new prison. The issue of a serious need for space needs to be addressed. “As a national average, it costs roughly $20,000 per year to keep an inmate in prison. There are approximately 650,000 inmates in state and local prisons, double the number five years ago. This costs taxpayers an estimated $18 billion each year. More than two thirds of the states are facing serious overcrowding problems, and many are operating at least 50 percent over capacity. (Joel, 1988)” Private prisons may be for profit, but if they can solve the issue of cost then it may be a