We are proud to announce that several of our team members presented at the 2nd annual BCMHSUS Concurrent Disorders Conference on Mar 10, 2022.
Dr. Heather Palis gave a talk titled “Mental health care utilization upon release from provincial correctional centres and risk of re-incarceration in British Columbia”. She described the association between mental health services access and re-incarceration among people with a mental illness diagnosis who were released from provincial correctional centres in BC between 2015 and 2018. Dr. Palis’s work, in collaboration with Dr. Amanda Slaunwhite and Professor Tonia Nicholls, demonstrated that people who received mental health services post-release had a 35% lower hazard of re-incarceration compared to those who did not. The analysis also demonstrated the relationship between timeliness of mental health services access and re-incarceration. Every additional month between release and community mental health services access was associated with a 5% increase in the hazard of re-incarceration.
Dr. Amanda Butler kicked off a session on the Community Transition Teams in BC Correctional Health providing an extensive overview of the literature demonstrating the need for CTTs. She explained that people who are released from prison, and people with concurrent disorders in particular, are at high risk of overdose, injury and health deterioration after a period of incarceration. The highest risk period are the days and weeks immediately following release. BC’s novel Community Transition Teams are designed to support people with substance needs leaving prison. The teams are equipped with social workers and peer support workers who meet the client where they are at – helping to ensure continuity of medication and connection with community-based supports including housing, social support groups, substance use treatment and primary care.
Finally, in collaboration with Sirui Wu, Dr. Amanda Butler and Dr. Maureen Olley (director of MH services, BC Corrections), professor Tonia Nicholls presented in a session entitled: “Mentally ill behind bars – How is the picture changing and how do MH courts & Forensic ACT Teams contribute to building capacity, recovery & reintegration”. She described expanding rate of social exclusion and mental health needs among individuals incarcerated across BC prisons (e.g., the proportion of people reporting homelessness, attempted suicide, etc) has increased from 2009 to 2017 and provided evidence that these disparities are variable across the centres and Health Authorities. Next steps in this program of research will include stratifying the sample by gender, ethnicity, examining prolific and violent offenders as well as other subgroups (e.g., sexual offences).
Congratulations to Dr. Nicholls, Dr. Palis, and Dr. Butler.