industry & policy
Later life behind bars
How aged care works in prison.
Phillip Snoyman interviewed
by Megan Tran
T
he number of aged inmates in custody is rising, but what
strategies are in place to provide a safe environment for
this growing cohort?
While most aged and frail inmates are housed in mainstream
jails, some correctional centres contain areas set aside exclusively
for older inmates.
Offender Management & Programs Corrective Services NSW
documents show that inmates who are Aboriginal or Torres Strait
Islander and 45 years or older, or non-Indigenous and 55 years
or older, are eligible for identification as aged and frail for the
purposes of placement and the provision of relevant services and
programs.
Dr Phillip Snoyman, director of statewide services at Corrective
Services NSW, said his department uses a multidisciplinary
approach for elderly inmates whereby they are screened for
services at the commencement of custody and, where identified,
support programs are co-designed with the offender.
He said the team must balance the rights and needs of the older
inmates with the needs of the broader inmate population, as well
as safety and security.
Aged Care Insite spoke with Snoyman to hear more about how
Australia approaches aged care in custody.
ACI: What’s the current model for elderly prisoners?
PS: Corrective Services NSW has a duty of care to provide a safe,
secure and humane environment for elderly inmates. Through
a multidisciplinary approach, elderly inmates are screened
for services at the commencement of custody. Identification
commences from the case management reception teams.
Processes ensure that they can be identified as having specific
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needs by any staff at any stage of incarceration. If Corrective
Services NSW staff suspect that an elderly offender has a specific
need, they make a referral to the statewide disability services.
Corrective Services also works collaboratively with the Justice
Health & Forensic Mental Health Network, including some
multidisciplinary case management models of care, to ensure
adequate services and program provision for security, physical,
cognitive and health needs. The Corrective Services offender-
centred collaborative case management model includes the
provision of services and programs targeting responsivity issues,
general wellbeing and consideration of individual life goals. And
in new reform, if we sentence an offender with more than three
months to serve, we’ll have an individualised case plan which is
co-designed with the offender.
Corrective Services and Justice Health guide the specific
intra-agency policy framework for elderly and frail inmates, and
this surrounds the case management placement and access to
additional living resources.
What challenges do older people face in prison?
They face many challenges. Elderly inmates may under-report
their needs. In prison, there’s a balance between privacy and
confidentiality with safety and security, and this is challenging in
relation to third parties being involved with interviewing elderly
inmates. It may be relevant to obtain information for assistance
purposes from a family, or to have the custodial representative
from a wing to participate in an inmate’s assessment with Justice
Health to ensure that information [is accurate]. An inmate may be
masking a hearing problem, may have incontinence, lack of insight
or may be masking their own cognitive decline. Or they may just
be reluctant to talk about things or require prompting, and this is
why a third party is often necessary.
The ability of elderly offenders to conform to mainstream
prison’s structured days can also be challenging. Elderly offenders
may struggle to remain in the yard for the duration of the
established routine, to successfully navigate their way around
the environment, to hear well and to understand and remember
verbal instructions, or to meet the time access for showers.
Offenders have been incarcerated for many years, and they
may be institutionalised or inflexible with their thinking. Substance