From inside prison health unit, she saw the impact of our policies

Re “Infirm prisoners shackle state coffers’’ (Page A1, May 21): I served as a mental health clinician at MCI-Shirley’s medium-security facility from 2011 to 2016. My role included carrying an ongoing client caseload as well as crisis duties. Much of the work involved seeing ill and dying men within the health services unit. Several clients became newly diagnosed with terminal illnesses, and died, during my tenure. One was an individual named in the class-action lawsuit the article cited. I met with and observed acute and chronic patients who were debilitated, blind, demented, unable to move. Some had lived in the health services unit for years.

The article captured the dilemma currently facing taxpayers. “Compassionate release’’ is a term that may apply to certain cases, but it is a separate issue. Many of the inmate patients in question have committed heinous acts. This is a financial issue, and should not be confused with a controversial word such as “compassion.’’

The term that should be used is “early medical release.’’ The Commonwealth could save millions of dollars if these truly impaired individuals could be cared for outside of the Department of Correction. The savings could be used to help educate our youth. Funds could be channeled into prevention programs, so as to interrupt the school-to-prison pipeline, or into our struggling mental health system.

I strongly disagree with Governor Baker’s decision to add further restrictive amendments to the legislation that was signed into law last month.

Roselle R. Mann

Waltham

The writer is a licensed independent clinical social worker.

Who will cover the cost of these prisoners’ care?

I agree with releasing terminally ill inmates for compassionate reasons, but the suggestion in the article’s subhead that millions of dollars could be saved is misleading. These elderly former inmates have limited resources. Where will they go for treatment of their chronic illnesses? My guess is they’ll turn to a government program, so much of the expense would be shifted to different agencies.

Charlie Tillett

Wayland

A prison’s locked medical wing is not ‘like any other nursing home’

I am dismayed by a comparison made in the article about aged prisoners. It read that “men with taut skin and thin faces lie on cots or slump in wheelchairs in a locked medical wing. . . . Inmates suffering from dementia and the debilitating consequences of stroke stare aimlessly. Some are incontinent and wear diapers. A few play games, color with crayons, and do puzzles. . . . This looks like any other nursing home, but behind bars.’’

Nursing homes have changed a great deal. They are not only physically beautiful and homelike, but they also provide personalized care, including high-quality rehabilitation, nursing care, and cognitively stimulating activities, not simply coloring and doing puzzles. Unfortunately, owing in part to ageist attitudes and myths about quality of care, they are underfunded, understaffed, and underappreciated.

There is a critical need for geriatric-prepared health professionals and care providers. The contention that a locked medical wing in a medium-security prison is the same as any other nursing home is false and damaging and only furthers the ageist attitudes that severely damage older adults and those who work in nursing homes.

Ruth Palan Lopez

Boston

The writer is a professor in the school of nursing at the MGH Institute of Health Professions.