GPs at the Deep End group publishes report on prison health
Published: 17 August 2022
The latest GPs at the Deep End report seeks to understand the significant unmet physical and mental health needs of patients in secure environments – where the inverse care law is acutely felt – and make recommendations for improvements
The Scottish Deep End group, comprising GPs from the 100 practices in Scotland serving the most socio-economically disadvantaged communities, hosted a roundtable discussion on prison healthcare in March 2022.
The subsequent report is now being shared with key organisations and individuals, in the hope that it will offer ideas for change within individual and organisational spheres of influence. This includes the work that needs to be done around improving governance, training, terms and conditions and work culture.
The impetus for this piece of work was the recognition that patients in secure environments are among the most marginalised members of our society. They often have significant unmet physical and mental health needs, some of which may drive criminal behaviour. There are opportunities during incarceration for healthcare needs to be addressed but this is extremely challenging to achieve, and the inverse care law is acutely felt.
Members of the Deep End group who are clinicians working in prison healthcare report significant challenges around:
- workforce and workload
- clinical and corporate leadership
- access to medical information
- IT interfaces, relevant training
- highly variable access to mental health and addiction care, and
- connectivity with other agencies
to name but a few.
The roundtable meeting offered a forum to better understand the factors driving these issues, and to make recommendations on how prison healthcare could be improved.
Those who attended are listed at the end of the report, and included clinicians, managers, and colleagues from Public Health Scotland, and Scottish Government. GPPC’s Dr David Blane co-authored the report and Professor Andrea Williamson also contributed.
First published: 17 August 2022
