Official: Prison has health care problem

Thursday, April 1, 2004 | 9:58 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- The medical care of inmates at the state women's prison in North Las Vegas is not up to par, the head of medicine for the state Department of Corrections said Wednesday.

Dr. Ted D'Amico told a legislative subcommittee that personnel working for the Corrections Corp. of America "have struggled from Day 1" to provide health care for the female inmates.

The corporation has the contract to operate the Southern Nevada Women's Correctional Facility. But it wants the state to take over medical care immediately, and it also has served notice it is pulling out of its contract to run the prison on Oct. 1.

D'Amico, who supervises the medical staffs at other prisons, told the subcommittee: "Mental health is in shambles." He said half of the female inmates are on psychotropic drugs.

CCA also "is behind in dental care" for the inmates, D'Amico said.

CCA has an excellent medical director now, after experiencing troubles in the past, but remains convinced that the state can provide better care for the women, and they're right, D'Amico said.

"They don't know how to run a medical program," D'Amico said.

The prison presented a plan to the Legislative Interim Finance Committee in January to take over the medical care for the women inmates. The state now pays CCA $47.29 per inmate a day to house and care for the inmates. CCA would return $14.71 per inmate to the state to provide the medical care for the rest of this fiscal year. The finance committee delayed action in January, saying it wanted to get better cost estimates on what CCA was paying for care. It appointed a subcommittee headed by Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio, R-Reno, who said Wednesday: "If the state takes over, we need to know the potential cost."

Legislative fiscal experts for the subcommittee said that CCA spent $18.36 last calendar year for each inmate per day at the prison, 21 percent more than the $15.15 per inmate that CCA proposes to pay the state beginning in July for the 2005 fiscal year.

D'Amico and other prison officials insisted they could provide the medical care for $15.15 a day per inmate next fiscal year, however.

The issue of the state takeover of the medical care will be discussed by the Interim Finance Committee on June 16.

The state has put out requests for proposals from private companies to replace CCA on Oct. 1. It has asked for bids to run the medical program, just the confinement operations or both.

The prison is also putting together a plan to see how it could measure up against the private companies.

The bids from the private companies are due May 4.