Improving the health & well-being of people with dementia in prison

• Research type

  Research Study

• Full title

  Improving the health and well-being of people with dementia and cognitive frailty in prison

• IRAS ID

  287796

• Contact name

  Rhoda MacRae

• Contact email

  rhoda.macrae@uws.ac.uk

• Sponsor organisation

  The University of the West of Scotland

• Duration of Study in the UK

  1 years, 6 months, 2 days

• Research summary

  Summary of Research
  The number of UK prisoners over 60 years has trebled between 2002 and 2016 (CPA, 2016). It is estimated that 8% of men over 50 years in prison have dementia (Forsyth et al 2020), this is considerably higher than for the same age groups in the community. The impact of not being recognised as having dementia in prison means people experience fear and distress and appropriate healthcare interventions cannot be offered. The aim of this 18 month study is to identify and develop new effective ways to improve the health and well-being of the increasing numbers of older people living with dementia in prison.
  To understand current healthcare pathways we will interview 12-16 staff from the four Scottish prisons with the largest over 65 years population. To understand dementia related experiences, healthcare needs, risk management and release processes we will build case studies. Semi-structured interviews will be conducted with ten prisoners living with dementia and up to three significant others involved in their health, social, spiritual or custodial care. These findings will be presented to three stakeholder groups 1) families and prisoner representatives 2) prison and healthcare professionals 3) strategic leaders. The workshops will facilitate stakeholders to design an evidence informed healthcare pathway and a model for promoting well-being and reducing health related risk. Stakeholders will also be invited to be members of the Research Advisory Group (RAG). Findings in video, blog and summary format will be prepared for prisoners’ magazine, professional journals, the websites of RAG members and social media platforms. We will produce a guidance document on the management of prisoners with dementia for prison and NHS healthcare teams. We will present findings at interdisciplinary, international and UK conferences, preparing papers for publication in academic journals.

  Summary of Results
  All the reports including the lay summary are available at https://eur03.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fclick.pstmrk.it%2F3ts%2Fdementiainprisons.com%252F%2FNBTI%2FVca5AQ%2FAQ%2F1e447953-bd05-4802-b247-05478e03f208%2F1%2FC_bOssNU1-&data=05%7C02%7Capprovals%40hra.nhs.uk%7C4f7a4dfa6cf14b9e643a08dd13b200aa%7C8e1f0acad87d4f20939e36243d574267%7C0%7C0%7C638688377439847686%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJFbXB0eU1hcGkiOnRydWUsIlYiOiIwLjAuMDAwMCIsIlAiOiJXaW4zMiIsIkFOIjoiTWFpbCIsIldUIjoyfQ%3D%3D%7C0%7C%7C%7C&sdata=nFWrCvCRIhSfqdDpT3j%2FStyOL3RkMcPEQmVhZKn7X9g%3D&reserved=0

• REC name

  East of Scotland Research Ethics Service REC 2

• REC reference

  21/ES/0034

• Date of REC Opinion

  6 May 2021

• REC opinion

  Further Information Favourable Opinion