Prisoner Intake Assessment

The prisoner intake process at prison facilities is important in that plays three pertinent roles: identification, classification, and needs assessment. These stages involve prisoner identification, development of prisoners’ record, carrying out of mental health and medical assessments, determination of the prisoners’ level of threat and appropriate security requirements to keep other inmates and the public safe. In most prisons in the United States, recommendations for cell and housing assignments are done by the personnel at the intake facility (L.Thigpen, Solomon, Hunter, & Ortiz, 2004). Intake systems for prisoners at prison facilities often include comprehensive security, mental health, and medical assessments to make sure that inmates are classified properly with regards to housing provisions, and the provisions of critical mental health and medical services or programs. To be effective, the assessment instruments ought to be designed to match the characteristics of the recipient of the care being given such as their medical history and their age.

The intake assessment questions listed below are designed to collect relevant information from Mr. Robert Palmer with the aim of assessing his behavior, functioning and observation; his health problems; his cognitive problems; and finally evaluation of mental health status.

Prisoner Intake Assessment Questions

1. Please tell me about your background and how you relate with your closest and distant family members?
2. What is your family of origin like?
3. Give me a brief description of your childhood?
4. So far, how would you describe your adult life?
5. In your past, have you had a formal mental health diagnosis from another mental health professional, psychiatrist, or a General Practitioner?
6. If you have had a mental health diagnosis in the past, what was it?
7. If you have had a prior diagnosis, did you agree with it?
8. Do you feel supported by your family or friends?
9. To what extent did you feel supported by the previous institution and the inmates there?
10. What are some of the stresses that you have in your life currently?
11. What are your anticipated future stresses
12. What accommodation concerns do you have that make you want to be isolated from the general population?
13. Have you been on any treatment in the past?
14. The treatments you were placed on in the past, did they work?
15. In your opinion what discoveries have you made about what works and what does not work for you?