Estelle V. Gamble Case Analysis

There are many sides of the healthcare industry. Majority of U.S. citizens have access to hospitals and urgent care centers, but many do not think about the health care conditions in federal, state, and local prisons and jails. Depending on the location, numerous amounts of prisoners did not receive the basic health care they should be provided with. Some may say that prisoners should not receive the right to health care because they just get it handed to them unlike everyday citizens. If the diseases, sicknesses, and illnesses are left untreated in prisons, prisoners can be released back into the community and the chance of contamination will be increase and spread healthy others in the area. If prisoners with mental illnesses, which is around …show more content…
Gamble also known as the Landmark Case. Multiple other cases led to this one, but none of them left a stronger impact than this one. In this case, a inmate by the name of J.W. Gamble was at work unpacking a truck at Texas Department of Corrections. As he was unpacking, a bale of cotton fell from the truck onto his back leaving him in desperate need of attention from a doctor. He was granted to a visit with a medical assistant at the prison’s hospital but was denied of any serious injury and sent back to his cell. He returned within two hours because of worsening back pain. This time he saw a doctor who prescribed pain relievers and a muscle relaxant because of the a lower back injury. Along with the prescriptions, he was granted a cell pass that allowed him to remain in his cell instead of working. The prescriptions continued, but after 24 days with a cell pass, it was cancelled which led to Gamble refusing to participate in his work. He was placed in administrative segregation for the month of December. He returned to the hospital in January 1974, but now he had to see medical director Dr. Gray. He once again had ongoing back pain, but in this meeting, Dr. Gray diagnosed him with high blood pressure as well. The requested prescription was not filled until 4 days after the appointment because the staff claimed to have lost it. He was kept in administrative confinement …show more content…
It is hard for prisons to gain staff members for the job. Many physicians do not want to work in correctional settings for many reasons. It is cramped, old, and outdated and they are working with tools and resources that are old and outdated limiting the expansion of medical testing. Many also do not want to deal with the patients because they fear them or have to treat inmates that will not make the process easy. Around 20 percent of prison physicians have received a bad mark on their record and can not land a job anywhere else. A great majority of the prison physicians do not have specialized training in certain medical fields and because of the lack of physicians, it is rare to find someone with specialized education. Also many of them are international graduates who are not certified, have no advanced training or specialties, may have a language barrier, or could have restricted licenses. Not having enough physicians is one problem, but the lack of specialized physicians is another. Many convicts struggle from addiction, contagious disease, and most importantly mental illness. Currently, the population of mentally ill in institutions dedicated to them has shrunk because they now reside in jail or prison. It is an estimated 50 percent of convicts in United States prisons are suffering from one or more mental illnesses. Many