Comparative Nursing Education for Correctional Health: An International Multi-Country Study

Health care in prisons represents one of the most complex and underserved areas of public health systems. Across Europe and comparable high-income jurisdictions, incarcerated populations experience a disproportionately high burden of mental illness, substance use disorders, chronic disease, infectious disease, and social vulnerability. At the same time, correctional health services face persistent workforce challenges, including recruitment difficulties, high turnover, moral distress, safety concerns, and limited professional development pathways.

Nurses constitute the backbone of prison health services, yet preparation for correctional health practice varies widely across countries and education systems. In many jurisdictions, prison health nursing is absent from pre-licensure curricula and is instead addressed through informal employer onboarding or ad hoc training. Where education exists, it differs substantially in scope, governance, clinical placement models, and alignment with human rights, trauma-informed practice, and safety standards. This fragmentation limits workforce preparedness, contributes to burnout and attrition, and undermines continuity and quality of care.

Despite growing policy attention to equivalence of care and prison health reform, there is no comparative, evidence-based framework describing how nurses are prepared for correctional practice across countries, nor robust evidence linking education models to workforce outcomes. This project addresses that gap.