(By Charmaine L. Sales CF RN)
I AM A Correctional Facility Registered Nurse (CF RN) in the USA. The year was 2006 when I received a call telling me that I was offered the full-time job as a Department of Corrections Correctional RN!
The facility that hired me is one of California’s largest women prisons here in the US. This state facility accommodates up to level 4 inmate population, which means, the highest tough offenders and criminals in the USA, especially in the state of California.
We deliver 24-hour medical, nursing psychiatric, and mental health care. Our facility is called California Institution for Women or CIW. Our current population is 1,200 female inmates with ages ranging from 21-90 years old.
The female inmates are classified as levels 1-4. They are grouped as such by the Courts in accordance with the Penal Code stipulations based on the severity of the crimes they have committed.
There are short-term sentences ranging from months to years up to life-term incarceration. The death sentence via lethal injection has been discontinued/stopped and has been changed to life sentences.
We have a remarkably diverse female inmate population and unfortunately, some of our inmates have their entire family incarcerated in the institution.
This is my very first RN service in the prison system. I did other RN jobs in the past but those were in hospital, treatment and clinic setting, and rehabilitation skilled nursing centers.
The challenge is quite overwhelming for many reasons. First, the kind of patients that I deal with and the corresponding patient care that I need to provide. Then the different approaches and adjustments required of me. This also includes the different methods and the scope of my nursing practice because of the penal code guidelines imposed by the department of corrections and rehabilitation.
Yet, at the time, I was extremely excited to enter the new job because of both the challenges and the benefits available to me. At that time of my life, I wanted a change of phase in my nursing career and tried to get away from bedside care.
Physical exhaustion and burnout are always a part of being an RN. Most definitely, my 14 years of being a prison/correctional RN has been rewarding. I can deliver patient care to all individuals regardless of age, color, race, and faith.
And in my case, whatever crime my inmate patients have committed, I see them as people who like you and me, need care, help, and attention. You need to separate all your biases, need not know, or ask why they are in state prison.
Yes, they are outcast of society: criminals, murderers, offenders, and yet they are also mothers, daughters, aunts, sisters, and grandmothers. They are under my care while they serve their prison time and prison sentences.
This is an incredibly unique care setting. Not everyone can do this job. Over the years, I have seen nurses come and go owing to different reasons.
As for me, I am going to retire here as an RN and proudly say, “This is one of my best nursing jobs here in the USA.”
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Charmaine L. Sales is the third child of the late lawyer and provincial board member Isabelo “Jun” M. Sales and late educator Rosalinda Lungay Sales, PhD, of the city of Tagbilaran, island-province of Bohol.
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In my radio talk show, Woman Talk, over 98.3 Home Radio General Santos, I realized that the Millennials and the Generation Z (aka Gen Z, iGen, or Centennials) which refers to the generation that was born between 1996-2010, and immediately after the millennials, have a good following.
Generation Z, like millennials, is the generation that has been raised on the internet and social media, with the oldest finishing college by 2020 and entering the workforce.
These are the generations that have all the platforms available to them. They do not hesitate to speak their minds out and assert themselves.
However, like other generations before them, they also have their own unique struggles. In fact, they are also labelled. These labels are discussed in Woman Talk by our millennial guests and our Millennial Speak segment hosted by Shiloh.
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Writer can be reached at belindabelsales@gmail.com. Twitter @ShilohRuthie./PN
