Pregnant Women in Prison 323births or miscarriages, lack of maternity clothes, housing in inappropriate facilities,
no facilities for mother and baby to stay together, no separate visiting areas for
children, and overcrowded prisons.
If adult-female prisons have these inadequacies for pregnant inmates, then it: is
unlikely that youth facilities would provide better services. Although they are chil-
dren themselves, teenage delinquents have babies of their own. A study conducted
by Brenner and Farrow (1995) found that 68% of the youth facilities had approxi-
mately one to five pregnant adolescents. For those facilities with pregnant youths,
"27% have no social work services available, 31% have no nursing or basic prenatal
care, 3$% have no obstetric prenatal services, 62% have no nutritionist available,
70% do not teach parenting, and 87% do not provide childbirth education classes"
(p. 329). it seems that services for these young mothers-to-be would be even more
crucial in youth facilities, yet they are not provided.
Despite the lack of services for pregnant inmates, studies have found that women
incarcerated during portions of their pregnancies may actually benefit from their
incarceration. Martin et al. (1997) reported that women who were incarcerated for
longer periods of their pregnancies gave birth to babies who weighed more than
did women who were incarcerated for shorter periods. Higher birth weight was
considered to be a sign of good health. These women also did not have babies with
significantly lower birth weights than women who had never been incarcerated. In
another study comparing births for women incarcerated during part of their preg-
nancy and births while not incarcerated at all, S. L. Martin, Rieger, Kupper, Meyer,
and Qaqish (1997) reported that although there were no significant differences in
birth weights between the two, an increase in amount of time spent incarcerated was
associated with an increase in birth weight. They hypothesized that because many
of these pregnant women have such chaotic lives on the street, the prison provides
a more stable environment with food, shelter, and safety, therefore improving the
health of their future infants.
For institutions providing adequate prenatal assistance, what types of programs
and standards do they include in their health care? Safyer and Richmond (1995)
described the services in New York City where the Montefiore Medical Center
provides health care to all inmates. For pregnant inmates, there are set standards
which include comprehensive counseling, assistance, and medical care according
to professional and legal requirements. If an inmate is identified as pregnant, she
is automatically considered to be a high risk. The pregnant women are prescribed
prenatal vitamins and iron supplements, and they are given routine prenatal care,
seeing medical staff a minimum of once every 4 weeks. The doctors visits become
more frequent the closer the women are to delivery. Doctors are present in the
institution around the clock. Prenatal counseling is provided to all pregnant women.
This counseling incorporates information about HIV transmission as well as general
pregnancy information. Women are also counseled about the negative effects of
drug use on themselves and their unborn baby. If they are addicted to heroin upon