Women in prison: concepts, clinical issues and care delivery

There are fewer than 5000 women imprisoned in England and Wales. Concepts applied to them come from mental health and social science. These are not always helpful to practitioners working with women prisoners but continue to inform strategy, services and practice. Clinical models of women prisoners, albeit powerful, suffer from ‘silo’ thinking, with little recognition of the interdependent nature of their problems. Many of these difficulties can be traced back to adverse experiences in childhood. Care delivery to imprisoned women has been improved by changes in NHS and prison partnerships. Currently there exists an additional opportunity to take forward the agenda for holistic clinical care with an appropriate emphasis on non-custodial options.