NCJ Number
183595
Journal
Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics Volume: 27 Issue: 3 Dated: Fall 1999 Pages: 213-215
Date Published
1999
Length
3 pages
Annotation
This article introduces a series of papers concerning end-of-life care and death behind bars.
Abstract
The articles in this volume contain several important themes. First, the demonization of offenders in the political discourse has made it difficult for advocates of quality end-of-life care for prisoners to be successful both in enacting and implementing reform. Second, if a dying inmate is granted compassionate release, most prison systems do not have the funds or the institutional impetus to provide adequate discharge planning for ill prisoners. Third, the primary business of prisons is security and detention, and the tension between these objectives and the need to have an open and caring relationship between caregivers and patients is “a daily reality” in prison hospitals. For this reason, in addition to hospice’s emphasis on palliative rather than therapeutic care, prison hospice offers a much needed innovation in end-of-life care behind bars. Finally, understanding and drawing on commonalties between inmate-patients and patients in the general community regarding end-of-life care must include understanding how prisoners’ legal status, and the coercion it inherently entails, makes health care in prisons different. References