Preventing Self-Injury and Suicide in Women's Prisons
| Published date | 07 November 2016 |
| Pages | 221-222 |
| Date | 07 November 2016 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JCP-06-2016-0019 |
| Author | Caroline Logan |
| Subject Matter | Health & social care,Criminology & forensic psychology,Criminal psychology,Sociology,Sociology of crime & law,Deviant behaviour,Public policy & environmental management,Policing,Criminal justice |
Preventing Self-Injury
and Suicide in
Women’s Prisons
Tammi Walker and Graham Towl
Review DOI
10.1108/JCP-06-2016-0019
This is a very good book, which should
be regarded as required reading for all
practitioners working in correctional
and forensic mental health services
with women and adolescent girls.
Why? Because the authors set
down the facts of self-harm and
suicide in this group, they highlight
what makes women and girls
vulnerable to and the establishments
they reside in facilitative of this
outcome, and they provide a manifesto
for its management and ultimate
prevention (all in 170 pages). And they
manage this because they are experts
inthefieldandtheyhaveaclarityof
vision that enables them to get
straight to the point.
What the authors recommend to
manage this endemic problem is not
rocket science: good assessment,
especially at critical times (e.g. at
reception into prison, or on transfer
to another facility, or back to the
community), formulation-based risk
management, appropriate, responsive,
proportionate, and coordinated
interventions throughout custody
and beyond, delivered by an informed,
skilled, and caring staff group, and in
a well-equipped and well-managed
environment. So why is the problem of
self-harm and suicide among women
and adolescent girls in custody as
endemic –and entrenched –as it is?
Why are repeated calls to address
this challenge seemingly unheard?
Why has it proven so hard to implement
what is so obvious by way of a
response? Why does it need such a
startlingly frank book such as this to try
to create impetus in our correctional
services? There are at least three
reasons why the implementation of
better systems to support and
help vulnerable women and
girls eludes us.
First, the challenge of self-harmful
behaviour by vulnerable and at risk
women and young girls in custody
requires a coordinated response from
beginning to end. Walker and Towl are
most clear on this. A coordinated
response would include competent staff
selection, training, and support
procedures. It would also mean the
implementation of a range of the
potentially effective interventions that
have been piloted around the world,
which are responsive to need both in
terms of its nature and severity in the
individual case, but also in terms of the
needs of the environments that manage
the prisoners at risk of acting harmfully
towards themselves. In addition, a
coordinated response requires good
leadership, both overall and within
individual establishments, to oversee a
strategic approach to the problem.
But because there is uncertainty in the
research about what works with whom,
and because prisons have so many
competing priorities, staff are stretched
across an increasingly wide range of
tasks rather than able to focus on
self-harm and suicide specifically.
Their attentio n to this problem
among so many others is just
too limited to make a coordinated
approach possible. Therefore,
well-intentioned plans to prevent and
manage risk of suicide and self-harm
are rendered unsustainable or
implemented in only a piecemeal
way, which severely limits their
effectiveness over time.
Second, a coordinated response to
vulnerable women and young girls
requires adequate funding –to enable
staff to receive the training and support
they need to understand what works for
whom, and to implement interventions in
a sensitive and compassionate way for
the time it takes to manage and
eventually reduce risk. However, funding
is very limited and cuts in financial
provision for correctional services are
happening in many jurisdictions.
VOL. 6 NO. 4 2016, pp. 221-222, © Emerald Group Publishing Limited, ISSN 2009-3829
j
JOURNAL OF CRIMINAL PSYCHOLOGY
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PAG E 22 1
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