Prison Health is Community Health: The Indiana Peer Education Program

Abstract

Background: Concerning health inequities have been found in incarcerated populations, which likely impact broader community health. This paper evaluates the Indiana Peer Education Program (INPEP ECHO), an initiative that aims to improve health knowledge using the Project ECHO (Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes) model to train people incarcerated in Indiana prisons (USA) as peer health educators inside prisons. Peer educators undergo a 40-hour training and then facilitate 10-hour long health education workshops inside their facilities over several days. Methods: We assessed the changes observed in pre- and post-session survey responses to estimate the impact this program had on peer educators and those they teach via multivariate regression analysis. We also examined peer educator qualitative data for emergent themes and confirmation of survey findings. Results: Findings from the 10-hour workshops showed improved knowledge scores and post-release behavior intentions. Peer educator surveys indicated increases in knowledge, health attitudes, and self-efficacy scores. Qualitative analysis affirms the latter finding and points toward peer educators acquiring expertise in the content they teach and how to teach it and that positive results likely expand beyond participants to others in prison, their families, and the communities to which they return. Further, peer educators shared they felt new purpose and hope tied to their participation in INPEP ECHO. Although these survey results show positive change in the short term, such improvements have been shown in other research to lead to improved middle- and long-term outcomes. Conclusions: Though preliminary, results indicate this type of public health intervention, training incarcerated individuals as peer educators on health topics, appears to increase important health knowledge and behavior intentions, which will likely lead to improvements in personal and public health outcomes. Results also point toward specific improvements associated with peers providing the education, and not external sources. The skills participants attain, as well, seem to increase their sense of purpose and self-efficacy, which have been shown to precede desistance from crime. While more work is necessary, the high costs associated with treating diseases like hepatitis C point toward an urgent need for programs like INPEP.