Carceral Health in Medical Education: Current Interventions and Future Directions

Incarcerated individuals in the United States face poor health care outcomes in part due to insufficient provider training in carceral care. Emerging initiatives, including lectures, clinical rotations, and service-learning address this gap. This scoping review evaluates the scope and effectiveness of such interventions to produce an evidence-based guide for future improvements in medical education and health care for incarcerated populations. We searched PubMed/MEDLINE, Embase, and Web of Science for peer-reviewed articles regarding initiatives involving both undergraduate medical education and carceral care. Seventeen articles from 2014 to 2024 fit these criteria. Our analysis reveals that future initiatives led by a combination of clinicians, academics, and community leaders trained in this space are strongly poised to impart meaningful changes in advancing carceral care in medical education.