Assessment of health status among incarcerated men

Few studies have focused on the health status of the incarcerated population in Taiwan. The purpose of this study was to assess disease risk factors in incarcerated men.

This was a cross-sectional study. All 1129 newly sentenced men older than 20 years received routine blood checkups and completed a face-to-face interview from November 2004 to February 2005.

The mean age was 35.6 +/- 9.9 years old (range, 20-69). Of 1129 enrollees, there were 558 subjects who had never used illicit drugs (49.4%), 149 subjects who inhaled amphetamine (13.2%), and 422 subjects who injected heroin (37.4%). The overall prevalence rates were 15.0% for obesity, 9.3% for diabetes mellitus, 19.3% for hypercholesterolemia, 48.0% for hypertriglyceridemia, 62.7% for abnormal alanine aminotransferase, and 16.6% for hyperuricemia. With a control group as a comparison, the incarcerated group was less likely to have hypercholesterolemia and hyperuricemia, but more likely to have hypertriglyceridemia and abnormal alanine aminotransferase.

Compared with nonincarcerated group, the incarcerated men are different in certain disease risk factors and smoking habit.