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Tuesday, Sep 13 2016

Full Issue

Mass. Justice System To Shift Approach Toward Prisoners With Mental Health Issues

Elsewhere, in other psychiatric news, parents can face challenges in securing mental health services at school for their kids. And a psychology internship program faces criticism at a Wisconsin juvenile prison.

Governor Charlie Baker will announce on Tuesday a substantial shift in how the state鈥檚 criminal justice system handles mentally ill people, moving the troubled Bridgewater State Hospital away from a prison model and toward a more clinical approach. The administration plans to shift mentally ill inmates convicted of state crimes out of the state prison in Bridgewater and into a separate facility, leaving behind other mentally ill inmates charged with sometimes minor crimes but not convicted. Baker would also beef up mental health services and place sharp limits on the contact that correctional officers have with inmates 鈥 contact that proved deadly in the case of 23-year-old Joshua Messier, who died in 2009 as guards wrestled him into restraints. (Sharfenberg, 9/13)

On a hot summer day last month, Sydney, 15, and Laney, 8, were enjoying their last two weeks of freedom before school started. The sisters tried to do flips over a high bar at a local playground. 鈥淵ou鈥檝e got to pull your hips into the bar, like you鈥檝e got to kick up like that,鈥 explained their mother, Selena.聽... Both girls have been diagnosed with mental illnesses 鈥斅燬ydney with bipolar disorder and Laney with a similar illness called disruptive mood dysregulation聽disorder. ...聽School has been a real challenge for them. That鈥檚 not unusual for the 1聽in 5聽children with a mental illness. (Gold, 9/13)

Corrections officials scrambled to salvage a psychology internship program at the state鈥檚 troubled juvenile prison聽after a national accrediting agency found it was poorly supervised, records show. Visitors from the American Psychological Association found interns weren鈥檛 given enough time to do their assessments, did not聽understand what was expected of them,聽were trained by staff who were not familiar with psychological tests and sometimes were not evaluated by their bosses. (Marley, 9/12)

This is part of the Morning Briefing, a summary of health policy coverage from major news organizations. Sign up for an email subscription.
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