by Professor Rob Poole, Centre for Mental Health & Society.
This article appears in our latest newsletter (Winter 2024) which can be downloaded here.
Bangor University’s Centre for Mental Health and Society (CFMHAS) was established in 2012 as a collaboration between social scientists and mental health clinicians, with a pump priming grant from the Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board Charitable Fund. Our main office is based in Wrexham. We have long standing interests in substance misuse and in prison medicine, and we have been conducting research with clinical colleagues based in HMP Berwyn, Wrexham, since it opened in 2017.
The primary care team in HMP Berwyn is led by Dr Justin Lawson. He has developed a medicines management procedure to ensure prescriptions of psychoactive drugs for prisoners are safe and appropriate. The aim is to reduce deaths due to the abuse of prescription drugs in the prison.
The regime is controversial, and we have conducted and published an evaluation of it. We have further work in progress with Dr Lawson.
We have a funded project in progress to evaluate the HMP Berwyn substance misuse treatment programme. It involves analysis of some hard data about who engages with the programme and who drops out, but it also involves interviews with men in the prison who have substance misuse problems, so that their views are properly taken into account in our eventual findings. A unique feature of the
research is that we are interviewing a group of men after release.
CFMHAS has a strong interest in the social determinants of mental health, and we have established a module on the subject for medical students on psychiatric placement in Wrexham. It involves getting students to spend time in HMP Berwyn, talking with the men, and helping them to see the link between social circumstances, physical and mental health, and offending behaviour. We are evaluating the impact of the project over four years, into the students early years as qualified doctors. We published preliminary findings.
Most of our research and academic activity is concerned with marginalised and disadvantaged groups of people, which means that it is relevant to, and links with, our work with offenders. For example, we have a programme of research on high-dose opioids prescribed for chronic pain, and have devised an intervention to help people rationalise their medication and achieve better pain management.
Last year, Dr Heidi Hales who is a Consultant Forensic Adolescent Psychiatrist, joined us as an Honorary Senior Research Fellow, having previously worked in West London. Heidi was a founder of the Group of International Researchers in Adolescent Forensic Services (GIRAF) and is the current chair. GIRAF meets monthly meetings to bring clinicians and academics together. The group has completed research and has more in progress. There are 52 members from 20 countries. She is part of a CFMHAS international collaboration with colleagues in Belgium and Southampton, conducting research on internet addiction in adolescents.
References:
Website: https://cfmhas.org.uk/
Relevant publications:
- Nafees S, Matusiak J, Taylor-Clutton A, Newman S, Poole R. INSIGHT: Evaluation of the Psychological Medicine Student Placements at HMP Berwyn, North Wales: Year One Findings. BJPsych Open. 2023;9(S1):S30-S31. doi:10.1192/bjo.2023.147
- Bebbington E, Lawson J, Nafees S, Robinson C, Poole R (2021) Evaluation of a framework for safe and appropriate prescribing of psychoactive medications in prison Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health, 31 (2), 131-142 https://doi.org/10.1002/cbm.2187
- Bailey J, Nafees S, Jones L, Poole R (2021) Rationalisation of long-term high dose opioids for chronic pain: Development of an intervention and conceptual framework British Journal of Pain 15(3) 326–334 10.1177/2049463720958731 https://doi.org/
- Campbell S, Poole R (2020) Disorderly street users of novel psychoactive substances: what might help? Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health, 30, 53-58 https://doi.org/10.1002/cbm.2146
- Poole R, Bailey J, Robinson CA (2020) The Opioid Crisis and British Prisons. Criminals behaviour and Mental Health 30, 1-5. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/cbm.2136
Research can transform lives. We want to support discoveries about what helps people with mental disorder who have been victims of criminal behaviour, or perpetrators of criminal behaviour, and their families, and the clinicians and others who treat them and, indeed, the wider community when its members are in contact with these problems. More effective prevention is the ideal, when this is not possible, we need more effective, evidenced interventions for recovery and restoration of safety.
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