Mental Health and Psychiatric Services for Prisoners According to The Mental Health Act B.E. 2551: A Case Study in Chiang Mai Central Prison.

Abstract

Objective: To study the efficiency, effectiveness and problems of mental health services for prisoners in Chiangmai Central Prison according to The Mental Health Act  B.E. 2551.

Materials and methods: This  was an evaluative research using the Input Output Model.  129 prison personnel (by simple random sampling) were trained between 1 April - 30 June 2019.  Regarding mental health knowledge, use of screening, psychiatric symptoms assessment form, counseling and stress relaxation. Information from the questionnaire regarding the knowledge before and after the training, and attitude assessment were analyzed  according to  statistics, frequency, percentage, mean, and paired sample t-test. Data from open-ended questions were interpreted according to classification method and content analysis.

Results:  From 113 participants (87.60% from the sample group or 62.43% of the population)  it was found that, in terms of efficiency, there was a policy and a manual of service provision. There were also trainings on mental health, counseling systems for personnel and telemedicine.   As for effectiveness, it was found that prisoners’  access to services increased from 110-120 to 130-140 per month. The average post-training score was 17.71, which was significantly higher than before the training (14.49) at the level of .01.  But the confidence in implementation  was found to be at a medium level.  The problems were  executives did not give enough importance to mental health problems , many prisoners, security system, workload, personnel’s lack of knowledge in mental health and skills in assessing dangerous behavior, including referral treatment according to the Mental Health Act, cooperation of prison personnel and integration with the mental health networks.

Conclusion: The development of the service system helped prisoners to access more services. The problems were executives did not give enough  importance to mental health problems, many prisoners, cooperation of personnel and networks.