Handled without Care: Women’s Health Experiences in Jail

Abstract

Purpose

This research explores the subjective health experiences of women incarcerated in a provincial detention center in Ottawa, Canada.

Methodology/approach

Narrative interviews conducted with 16 previously incarcerated women were analyzed to explore how health issues shaped their experiences in detention.

Findings

Women identified a set of practices and conditions that negatively impacted health, including the denial of medication, medical treatment, and healthcare, limited prenatal healthcare, and damaged health caused by poor living conditions.

Research limitations/implications

Findings suggest that structural health problems emerge in penal environments where healthcare is provided by the same agency responsible for incarceration. The incompatibility between the mandates of incarceration and healthcare suggests that responsibility for institutional healthcare should be transferred to provincial healthcare bodies.

Originality/value

This research responds to the lack of research on carceral health experiences within both penal scholarship and medical sociology, particularly in relation to women and those confined in jails.

Citation

McKendy, L. (2018), "Handled without Care: Women’s Health Experiences in Jail", Gender, Women’s Health Care Concerns and Other Social Factors in Health and Health Care (Research in the Sociology of Health Care, Vol. 36), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 275-297. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0275-495920180000036017