by Eike Blohm MD

Pretrial hearings in February 2023 at Guantánamo Bay in the case against Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri – the man accused of devising the 2000 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole – included a stunning revelation: Detainees at the U.S. military base in Cuba were repeatedly subjected to sexual ...

by Eike Blohm, MD

Hemorrhoids are a very common problem that people do not like to talk about because of their intimate location. Hemorrhoids are both preventable and treatable, but can become significant health problems if ignored.

What exactly is a hemorrhoid?

A hemorrhoid is a vein that has been ...

by Eike Blohm, MD

Various medications are available to prisoners for purchase in commissaries and can be taken without instructions from medical staff. Yet taken incorrectly, these medications may have significant adverse effects or result in false positive drug tests, leading to loss of good time and potentially solitary confinement.

Acetaminophen

Acetaminophen (Tylenol ®) is one of the most frequently used analgesics (pain reliever) in the U.S. It also has antipyretic (fever reducing) effects. Despite decades of use, it is still not entirely understood how it actually works. Likely, it modulates the sensation of pain in the brain rather than working at the site where the pain originates. A person can safely take 1,000 mg three times a day if the doses are spaced six-to-eight hours apart. In normal dosing, acetaminophen does not damage the liver and even people with cirrhosis (liver scarring) can safely take the medication. However, using more than 6,000 mg a day can lead to liver damage.

Non-steroidal Anti-inflammatory Drugs

In addition to treating pain and fever, NSAIDs also fight inflammation. The process of inflammation is integral to the body repairing damaged tissue (e.g., ankle sprain) and fighting infection (e.g., cellulitis). Unlike acetaminophen, NSAIDs actually address ...

by Eike Blohm, MD

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is highly overrepresented among U.S. prisoners, along with other infectious illnesses such as MRSA, Hepatitis-C and tuberculosis. [See: PLN, Jan. 2023, p.38; Feb. 2023, p.52; and June 2023, p.41.]

The high prevalence of HIV among prisoners is due to the selective incarceration of Americans who struggle with intravenous substance use, as well as a lack of mandatory and universal testing protocols in prisons.

After an initial outbreak infected five gay men in Los Angeles in June 1981, the then-unknown disease was called GRIDS: gay-related immunodeficiency syndrome. Coinciding with what was then still a young movement for gay rights, HIV/AIDS became stigmatized as a punishment for what many religious people view as sinful and immoral behavior. Sadly, the negative impact of this stigmatization persists even today.

How is HIV transmitted?

HIV is a virus transmitted from one person to another by blood, usually due to unprotected sexual intercourse or sharing needles (e.g., during tattooing or drug use). It cannot be transmitted through casual contact such as shaking hands or exchanging hugs, nor by inanimate objects such as toilets seats or drinking cups. Thus, an HIV-positive cellmate does not pose an infection risk ...

by Eike Blohm, MD

After a month of foot-dragging, the Tennessee Department of Corrections (DOC) complied with a court order on February 24, 2023, releasing surveillance video of a death-row prisoner who cut off his own penis and was then left strapped to a foam mattress in his cell.

Henry ...

by Eike Blohm

After turning down offers to settle for far less, South Carolina’s Aiken County wound up on the losing side of a $150,000 verdict on November 4, 2022, after a state court jury found that a guard at the county lockup crushed a detainee’s scrotum during a rough ...

by Eike Blohm, MD

After a 2019 incident during which a prisoner gave birth in her cell – delivering a baby into the toilet while guards ignored her cries for help – Arizona’s Perryville Prison in Buckeye started inducing labor for pregnant prisoners.

Inducing labor involves intravenous administration of drugs ...

by Eike Blohm, MD

Tuberculosis (TB) is an illness caused by a mycobacterium, a class of bacteria that is hard to see under the microscope, difficult to grow in culture, and has the audacity to live in the very immune cells (marcophages) that are tasked with hunting and killing bacteria. ...

By Eike Blohm, MD

After two years of negotiations between the federal Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Massachusetts Department of Correction (DOC), an agreement was reached on December 20, 2022, to fix atrocious mental health care in state prisons, which the Feds consider so “cruel and unusual” that it ...

by Eike Blohm, MD

Drugs are ubiquitous behind prison walls, but screening of items sent to prisoners and random drug testing incentivizes the use of substances difficult to detect and easy to conceal. Synthetic cannabinoids, known under numerous monikers such as K2 and Spice, fill that niche.

Originally synthesized by ...