{"id":7463,"date":"2026-05-26T11:38:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T10:38:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/?p=7463"},"modified":"2026-05-26T11:38:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T10:38:13","slug":"better-early-days-support-required-to-combat-self-inflicted-deaths-in-reception-prisons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/2026\/05\/26\/better-early-days-support-required-to-combat-self-inflicted-deaths-in-reception-prisons\/","title":{"rendered":"BETTER EARLY DAYS SUPPORT REQUIRED TO COMBAT SELF-INFLICTED DEATHS IN RECEPTION PRISONS"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Prisons and Probation Ombudsman has published a new bulletin examining the high rates of self-inflicted deaths in reception prisons. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">People entering reception prisons are mostly on remand or are unsentenced. For some, it may be their first time entering a prison. This group of prisoners face a considerable degree of uncertainty about their future &#8211; and are therefore deemed more vulnerable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In 11% of cases assessed by the Ombudsman, self-inflicted deaths occurred within the first 48 hours of entering a reception prison and 30% occurred within the next three weeks, meaning that 41% occurred within the very first month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Collaboration between healthcare and prison staff was too-often insufficient in identifying and managing risk in prisoners. A lack of meaningful communication and engagement with this group further contributed to their risk of suicide and self-harm. In 7% of cases, the Ombudsman found issues with prisoners\u2019 phone accounts, effectively blocking their access to support during their earliest days in custody.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Though early days in reception prisons presented the highest period of risk, the Ombudsman also found that 36% took their life beyond spending three months in a reception prison and 41% of deaths assessed occurred near a court hearing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The report encourages greater awareness of the vulnerabilities of this particular cohort of prisoners \u2013 with better staff training on how to identify and manage their risks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For further information,&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/ppo.gov.uk\/learning_research\/fatal-incident-investigations-learning-lessons-bulletin-issue-22-self-inflicted-deaths-in-reception-prisons\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><u>click here.<\/u><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Prisons and Probation Ombudsman has published a new bulletin examining the high rates of self-inflicted deaths in reception prisons. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Amelie","author_link":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/author\/amelie\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"The Prisons and Probation Ombudsman has published a new bulletin examining the high rates of self-inflicted deaths in reception prisons. [&hellip;]","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7463"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7463\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7464,"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7463\/revisions\/7464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prisonersadvice.org.uk\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}