We hypothesized that treating mentally ill inmates involuntarily with antipsychotic medication would reduce the number of prison inpatient days and the number of inmates who receive disciplinary charges. The subjects were 133 mentally ill inmates who were placed on the New Jersey Department of Corrections (NJ DOC) nonemergency involuntary medication protocol and received antipsychotic medication for at least one year. No difference was noted in an inmate's mean number of prison inpatient days in the year before versus the year during involuntary medication.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Am Acad Psychiatry Law
February 2010
We present the case of a middle-aged defendant who had been incarcerated in a county jail and housed on the mental health unit. It was documented that he had been exhibiting fluctuating levels of alertness and responsiveness. The writers saw him in a forensic capacity, to conduct an evaluation of his competence to stand trial, and recognized that he was having a medical emergency, delirium that was most likely due to brain metastases from inoperable advanced cancer.
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