Another Official Tied to Jail Services Quits
Source: By PAUL von ZIELBAUER, New York Times, January 31, 2006
The deputy commissioner responsible for the city health department's Medicaid and jail health care programs resigned last Friday after only seven months on the job. His resignation is the latest of several recent departures and reassignments of doctors and administrators who supervised jail medical and mental health services, including the resignation this month of the assistant commissioner who oversaw the jail health program's daily operation. ..... Managing a jail health care program as complex as New York City's is a daunting task for any administrator, one that the city's Tennessee-based medical contractor, Prison Health Services, has often made more difficult, city officials say, since taking over the contract in 2001. With varying degrees of success, city health officials have repeatedly prodded the company to improve its care, particularly for mentally ill and suicidal inmates, six of whom hung themselves during a six-month period in 2003. At the moment, only one of the top two jobs in charge of the health department's jail health care program is filled, and not by a doctor, leaving no one with much experience dealing with inmates' medical problems to monitor Prison Health Services.