How Health Care Is Administered in Us Jails and Prisons

How Health Care Is Administered In U.S. Jails and Prisons

In 1976, the highest Court in the United States ruled in the Ruiz vs. Estelle court case to grant prisoners the right to medical care (Amos, 2001). The jury ruled that deliberate unresponsiveness to serious medical care of prisoners contravenes the provisions of the 8th Amendment. The Bureau of Prisons (BOP) provides healthcare to prisoners through In-house Medical Providers employed by the Bureau of Prisons. The medical personnel assigned to the BOP are sourced from the public health service. The other method of administering health care to inmates is through medical personnel contracted to provide comprehensive health care or individual medical service to prisoners.

In-house medical provision is implemented in the 114 institutional under the care of BOP (Amos, 2001). This form of medical administration provides routine and ambulatory services to inmates. The House Service Units (HSU) in jails provides medical facilities for moderate and severe illness. The units provide diagnostic and ambulatory care since they are equipped with assessment and treatment equipments needed to provide health care to inmates. The facilities present in HSUs are laboratories, dental clinics, pharmacies administrative offices and waiting areas for prisoners (Amos, 2001). This system of medical administration in jails is made possible given that there are medical personnel like physicians, dentists, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, psychiatrists and other medical personnel. Patients with chronic or acute medical conditions are treated in medical referral centers operated by BOP through the in-house medical provision.

Contracted medical providers are awarded comprehensive and individual contracts to supplement the healthcare administration in jails. Comprehensive contracts provide a wide range of medical services. However, individual contracts are sought to provide specific specialized medical services. Comprehensive contracts worth more than $100,000 are handled by the BOP field acquisition office (Vitucci, 2009). Conversely, the institutions contracting office handle contracts worth less than this amount. Currently, there are over 108 comprehensive contracts for