Issues and Innovations in Prison Health Research

Abstract

This book examines the profound implications that custodial settings - including prisons, young offender institutes and immigration removal centres - can have for the health of the people who live and work within them. It discusses the issues encountered when researching health in these settings and the innovative methods required to overcome them. The multiple and complex health needs of these people, often from extremely disadvantaged and marginalised communities, is generally neglected within both criminology and medical sociology despite increasing mortality rates and the marked increase in the population of older people in these settings. This edited book explores a range of contrasting perspectives on health and health research in custodial settings, emerging methodological and ethical aspects of conducting health research in custodial settings, and a number of innovative approaches to custodial setting health research, utilising a range of qualitative and quantitative methods. It brings together chapters from students, scholars, practitioners and service users from a range of disciplines including medical sociology, medical anthropology, criminology, and public health to provide a comprehensive appraisal of an overlooked concern, and insights into both scholarship and practice.