Abstract

People with dual diagnosis have complex needs
and vulnerabilities that may lead to incarceration in
prisons. Mental health and substance use services
in prisons should have the capabilities to address
their needs while incarcerated and facilitate the
transfer of care to community services on release.
In order to develop these capabilities, a training
programme is required.
A pilot training programme for dual diagnosis
was developed and piloted in five London prisons.
The training was based on a training needs
assessment of prison staff and consultation with
service users. It was delivered in two forms: a fiveday
classroom based course, and a ‘blended
learning’ method that comprised a manual and
three sessions of supervision. The course was
evaluated by a brief questionnaire that included
items on attitudes, self-efficacy and knowledge
about working with dual diagnosis.
The evaluation of the training revealed that all
workers, no matter what method of training they
received increased their perception of their skills
(self-efficacy) and increased their attitudes.
Knowledge remained the same (although the
scores pre-training were high). There was no
difference between the two types of training when
mean scores were compared at post-training. There
was also no difference between the mental health
and substance workers regarding their mean scores
at follow-up, apart from knowledge.
The conclusion is that the training pilot was
evaluated positively and did indicate that it has some
effect on attitudes and self-efficacy. More rigorous
evaluation of the impact of the training is required,
using a robust methodology and assessing the
impact on clinical skills and service user outcomes.