Correctional Policies and Efficiencies in the US

¶ … Agency's Role The Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) is an agency under the prison health care systems. The Institution was established to provide a more humane and modern care for state prisoners, make the prison service more professional, and to oversee reliable and central management of the government prisons. The key role of this agency is to restrict perpetrator to a humane, safe, secure and cost-efficient location for them to spend time for the criminal offenses they have committed and receive the care that is needed.

BOP also has a responsibility of reducing the possibility of future criminal offenses and law offenses wit programs where violators are prevented from breaking the law again. Statistically, these programs have proven to be very effective. BOP workers help criminals by offering a variety of services and programs to inmates, to help prepare them to regain a lifestyle with morals and live a life that avoids being a repeat perpetrator. BOP agency is accountable for the management of the government prison structure.

In addition, the agency manages criminals who committed crimes categorized as felonies (Whitehead, Jones & Braswell, 2008). The agency's impact on health care From the BOP agency's role, the recent downwards trend in per capita prisoner medical care costs is due to execution of various cost-containment projects. In the past years, BOP has put into place a number of projects to address medical care costs. In response to rising prison health care costs, BOP authorities recognized continuous and planned cost-containment projects.

BOP has revealed that some of the continuing projects have led to cost savings. The BOP has also applied a policy to accomplish the creation and execution of innovative medical care directives and does not resuscitate (DNR) orders (Siegel & Bartollas, 2011). Each BOP department is to have a policy covering innovative directives and DNR orders.

The policy must entail a copy of relevant state laws: an example of standard forms for prisoner use is available from the relevant state law; guidelines for prisoners to implement innovative directives, including the option of maintaining a private attorney at the inmate's expense. The agency's policy requires a record of inmate's applied innovative directives in the inmate's health record. The policy must also provide DNR information that is in accordance with the law of the state in which the agency is located.

An example of the agency carrying out its duties BOP does not allow its pharmacies to dispense herbal medicines. A full history is usually completed within 14 days of arrival at the allocated facility. The facility doctors are usually family practice or internal medicine professionals. They control an inmate's access to specialized health care and evaluate any recommendations made by healthcare professionals to determine whether they are within the scope of service and policy of the BOP before execution.

In order for a prisoner to receive care or treatment by a professional, including physical intervention, the mid-level practitioner would have to identify the inmate's disease and alert the facility's doctor who would then decide whether to refer the prisoner to a professional if one is available. In case the facility's doctor decides that, a referral to a professional is warranted for a non-emergency condition, such as physical therapy, the utilization evaluation committee must authorize that referral.

The BOP seeks to obtain healthcare specialized care for its inmates through collaborating with local medical centers (Whitehead, Jones & Braswell, 2008). However, contracts with medical centers do not necessarily include services of specialized doctors. In fact, each department of the BOP uses a variety of procurement practices to identify agreements with both medical centers and individual doctors and other healthcare professionals for specialized care. Regulatory authority the agency has in relation to health care The soaring health care costs of prisoners have been of great concern for the BOP.

In 1992, a report released by the BOP recognized that the healthcare costs for prisoners have been escalating and this has been a significant concern. The BOP has singled out factors that were contributing to inmate health care costs and initiated programs that seek to contain these costs. Moreover, the BOP has launched corrective actions to regulate the escalating costs. Under the federal regulations, the BOP must provide suitable healthcare to all prisoners in its custody.

Under the regulation, the Attorney General has delegated authority to the BOP, to request Public Health Service officers to be assigned to support with the direct medical care delivery to inmates. The BOP has a direct authority to serve medical care and treat prisoners under the directives of the Medical Director. All activities related to the inmates' physical and mental care are administered by the medical director.

The BOP initiated inmate health care cost containment initiatives to address skyrocketing costs and to meet the health care demands of an expanding prison populace. These initiatives are geared towards serving quality medical care while containing costs. The agency's process for accreditation, certification, and authorization Accreditation Process- The accreditation process requires that the BOP agency must voluntarily participate in the accreditation process. The agency begins by contacting the American Correctional Association (ACA) to request for accreditation.

Then, ACA sends the agency a relevant manual that contains standards, policy, procedures and standards compliance checklist. During the accreditation review process, regional manager is appointed to give advice to the agency. The agency should complete a report on self-evaluation and submit it to ACA. The agency will then proceed and schedule an audit. The accreditation audit involves evaluating mandatory and non-mandatory standards. The agency must fully comply with the mandatory standards and is expected to 90% comply with the non-mandatory standards to be accredited (Siegel & Bartollas, 2011).

Certification- The specifications of the certification process are the same for all types of agencies-state, nation, government and private. The agency sign a contract, pay a certification fee, perform a self-evaluation, and acquire a standard compliance audit from qualified ACA advisors before a certification.