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Corrections Stress - 4. Programs & Program Effectiveness

  • document preview for Improving Correctional Officer Wellness Through a Multifaceted Approach

    Improving Correctional Officer Wellness Through a Multifaceted Approach

    "Seven staff fatalities including three suicides in just three years (2010-2012). For professionals who operate correction facilities, stress can be a significant issue with fatal consequences. The Middlesex Sheriff’s Office (MSO) had 45 staff fatalities over the past 30 years. Twenty-four percent of these deaths were suicide. MSO believes the other deaths are tied to stress and wellness related health issues such as heart attack, stroke, diabetes and high blood pressure. MSO Sheriff Peter Koutoujian assumed the leadership role at...

  • Oregon Department of Corrections’ Wellness & Resiliency Pilot Program (WRP): Contrasting Pre-Post Survey Measures Between WRP and a Comparison Group (2015)

    In the Spring of 2013 the Oregon Department of Corrections (henceforth referred to as the 'department') began a collaboration with the Prison Mindfulness Institute to explore the efficacy of mindfulness/ meditation practice to promote wellness and resiliency of staff working in the department's prisons. The goal of this project was to learn more about how introducing staff to basic mindfulness/ meditation skills might impact staff climate/culture and individual staff's self-awareness and emotional resiliency.

  • The prevention of trauma reactions in police officers: Decreasing reliance on drugs and alcohol (2013)

    Australian study - The overall aim of this study was to develop and evaluate a resilience training program designed specifically to help new-recruit police officers mitigate stress reactions and the use of drugs and alcohol.

  • Role of a US-Norway Exchange in Placing Health and Well-Being at the Center of US Prison Reform (2020)

    Living and working conditions in many US correctional facilities are damaging to the health of incarcerated people and correctional staff. In response, experts have called for efforts to improve the health of incarcerated people, and correctional systems have invested in “officer wellness” programs. Some correctional systems outside the United States have taken a different approach to these challenges: developing a correctional culture (defined here as the values, beliefs, and norms of a correctional institution or system) that deliberately puts health, humanity, and rehabilitation at the forefront of correctional practice. We describe the feasibility and early results of Amend, our program...