Variations in Drug and Alcohol Treatment Utilization across Men's Prisons

• In Event: 600 - Section on Crime, Law and Deviance Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 05. Incarceration and Health

Abstract

U.S. inmates comprise a vulnerable group with a substantial need for substance use treatment services. To date, research has examined the organizational and structural factors that predict the availability of prison treatment services including evidence-based treatment. The current study examines if the prison social context influences whether male inmates use treatment services while incarcerated. Results from a national sample (2004 Survey of Inmates in State Correctional Facilities) are used to answer the following questions: (1) is there variation across prisons in inmate reports of using treatment services? (2) to what degree does the prison context moderate the association between inmate substance use dependence and using treatment services? and (3) which features of the prison social context are associated with substance dependent inmates using treatment services above and beyond compositional effects? Multilevel modeling techniques reveal that the prison context matters for treatment utilization for male prison inmates and that there is a high level of treatment need in this sample. At the average state prison, about one-quarter of inmates utilize treatment with estimates showing a range of treatment utilization from 9% to 53% depending on the prison. The findings also identify unique features of the prison social context that are important for inmate utilization of treatment services including age structure and race/ethnic makeup, security level (proportion violent offenders), use of solitary confinement, and work/education programming and work assignment. Structural-level interventions to reduce treatment usage are discussed.

Author

• Kathryn Marie Nowotny, University of Colorado-Boulder