BRIDGES TO ACCESS 2023:
HEALTHCARE IN THE JUSTICE SYSTEM
Bridges to Access: Healthcare in the Justice System was held on February 11th, 2023. It addressed incarcerated patient populations and the relationship between medicine and the department of corrections.
According to the National Commission on Correctional Healthcare, 40% of incarcerated people report a chronic health condition and almost a quarter have a diagnosed mental illness. Struggling people are entering into a strained system inundated by problems related to overcrowding, understaffing, limited mental health resources, deteriorating facilities, and sanitation.
On February 12th, 2023, the Bridges to Access Team partnered with Unity Clinic and ReMerge to host a community outreach event. This event advocated for the health and well-being of our community, specifically those who have been impacted by the justice system, by providing health screenings and resources for those families.
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
Exposing the Deadly Health Risks of Incarceration
Homer Venters is a physician and epidemiologist working at the intersection of incarceration, health and human rights. Dr. Venters currently works as a Federal Court Monitor of health services in jail and prison settings and previously worked as Chief Medical Officer for the NYC Jail system. In addition to authoring Life and Death in Rikers Island, Dr. Venters has led over 50 peer reviewed scientific publications on the topics of health and justice involvement, work that has been cited by the US Supreme Court. He has also testified before Congress regarding health care in Immigration and Federal Prisons systems. Dr. Venters received his MD from the University of Illinois, Masters of Public Health Research from NYU and completed his residency in Social Internal Medicine at Montefiore Medical Center. Dr. Venters has also worked in the nonprofit sector as the Director of Programs of Physicians for Human Rights and President of Community Oriented Correctional Health Service. Dr. Venters is an adjunct faculty member of the New York University College of Global Public Health.
Homer venters, MD
Serving the Underserved Behind Bars and Razor Wire: Mental Health Needs and Timely Strategies
Dr. Penn is a Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry, at the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB), Galveston, Texas. He has more than 20 years of correctional health care experience. He is the director of mental health services for UTMB Correctional Managed Care (CMC). UTMB CMC provides medical, dental, psychiatric and mental health and other specialty care to state prisoners within the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ), the largest state prison system in the US, as well as juvenile offenders within the Texas Juvenile Justice Department (TJJD), and several Texas county jails.
Dr. Penn received his medical degree from UTMB. He completed a residency and chief residency in psychiatry, and a fellowship in child and adolescent psychiatry, in the Department of Psychiatry, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. He completed an additional fellowship in forensic psychiatry at Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut. He returned to his home state of Texas in 2008, and is based in North Houston/Conroe, Texas.
Bilingual and bicultural, Penn is triple board certified in general, child and adolescent, and forensic psychiatry. He serves as the board liaison from the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law (AAPL) to the National Commission on Correctional Health Care (NCCHC). He is the immediate past chair of the NCCHC Board of Directors. He is past chair, American Psychiatric Association (APA) Council of Children, Adolescents and Their Families. Penn is a past president of the Texas Society of Psychiatry Physicians (TSPP), and is the president of the Titus Harris Society.
Dr. Penn has served as a consultant regarding correctional and non-correctional mental health care delivery and standards of care. He has published and
presented on correctional health care, and numerous law and psychiatry issues, including seclusion and restraint, restrictive housing, psychotropic medications, telemedicine and telepsychiatry, transgender and gender dysphoria, access to mental health care in correctional settings, suicide prevention, violence risk assessment and prediction of future violence. In 2005 he was named to Best Doctors in America.
joseph penn, MD
Breakout Speakers
Rachael Picon is the current Vice President of Adult Outpatient Services at Northcare Community Mental Health Center. She earned a Master’s of Science in Social Work from Columbia University in New York and is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with over twelve years of experience providing co-occurring and trauma informed care. She has training in a multitude of evidence-based models including cognitive behavioral therapy and dialectical behavioral therapy. She has spent the last ten years in leadership positions focused on programs that partner with community members and other non-profits to provide integrated behavioral health care to the most vulnerable in our community.
RACHEL PICON, LCSW
Shiann Copeland has served in a variety of positions working with post-conviction clients navigating the community after a prison sentence. Called to the field by her personal experiences, she has an ACE score of 9, which serves as a constant reminder that with community support and the meaningful opportunity to change we can break the cycle of incarceration, addiction, and poverty in Oklahoma. She has served the last 3 years as the Director of Programs at ReMerge, serving clients prior to a conviction. In her time at ReMerge she has led the team in redeveloping the program to increase curriculum by 50% and developing measures to monitor and improve outcomes like the outstanding 4% recidivism rate. A huge component of the ReMerge program is the Health and Wellness Department where health services and a fitness program are coordinated for every participant during the two-year diversion program. Through this department each participant receives dental, vision, general medical, well-woman, and STD testing immediately upon entering the program; all services that have previously taken a back seat to the burdens a participant carries trying to enter recovery.
Shiann Copeland
Dr. Adele Upchurch received a BS in Microbiology from the University of Tulsa in 1979. She went on to work as a clinical microbiologist for two years before attending the University of Oklahoma College of Dentistry in 1981. Upon graduating in 1985, she became a commissioned officer with the United States Public Health Service. She began her career with the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Lexington, Kentucky in 1988 and completed an advanced general practice residency with the Indian Health Service from 1992-1994. Dr. Upchurch has 32 years of experience treating incarcerated populations and currently practices at the Federal Transfer Center in Oklahoma City, where she has served as Chief Dental Officer since 2002.
DR. ADELE UPCHURCH
Dr. Fisher is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine, completed residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, and has been certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine since 1988. He was awarded the Stewart Wolf Society Outstanding Resident in Medicine in 1988. He has been a Fellow of the American College of Physicians since 1998 and a volunteer faculty clinical assistant professor for the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine. He has been published in the Archives of Internal Medicine and served as a reviewer for the Journal of the American Medical Association .
From 1988 through 2006, Dr. Fisher had a private practice in General Internal Medicine in Edmond Oklahoma, providing inpatient and outpatient adult medical care. He served as Chairman of the Department of Medicine and Chief of Medical Staff for Edmond Regional Medical Center. In 2014-2015, he worked for SSM Health as an outpatient internal medicine geriatric primary care physician.
Dr. Fisher began his Correctional Medicine career in 2007 with the Oklahoma Department of Corrections, with emphasis on chronic disease management. He has served on the Performance Improvement, Pharmacy & Therapeutics, and Utilization Review Committees and has been Lead Physician, Regional Supervising Physician and currently is the Chief Medical Officer overseeing all health services for the Oklahoma Department of Corrections. He was appointed to the American Correctional Association’s Coalition of Correctional Healthcare Authorities as Oklahoma’s representative in 2021 and is a member of the American Correctional Association.
ROSS FISHER, MD
Carrie Blumert has served as an Oklahoma County Commissioner representing District 1 since January of 2019 and is the youngest woman in state history to hold the position. Her background includes a Bachelor’s of Science from Oklahoma State University in Child and Family Services and a Masters of Public Health from the University of Oklahoma. Before getting elected Carrie worked for the Oklahoma City County Health Department managing public private partnerships. She is passionate about mental health, addiction treatment, justice reform, and getting more women elected to public office.
COMMISSIONER CARRIE BLUMERT
Dr. Mcleod is currently the Associate Director, and an Associate Professor, with the University of Oklahoma, Anne and Henry Zarrow School of Social Work. He is a former police detective and forensic mental health clinician, who transitioned into academia and his work centers on uncovering and disarming the origins of criminal behavior. Over the past 10 years Dr. Mcleod has acquired over $22 million in external funding to support research related to these topics. He has almost 70 publications to his credit and is presented over 115 academic presentations on various topics related to the subject. He is the President-Elect of the National Organization of Forensic Social Work, and the Editor in Chief of the Journal of Forensic Social Work. He is an affiliate faculty member with the OU Carceral, Consortium, Department of Women’s and Gender Studies, The Center for Social Justice, The Institute for Community and Society Transformation, and the Ruth Knee Institute for Transformative Scholarship. For more on his work visit www.damcleod.com.
DR. DAVID MCLEOD, PHD, MSW
Dr. Price is a board certified gynecologist with a sub-specialization in Female Pelvic Medicine and Reconstructive Surgery (Urogynecology). She serves as the Medical Director and the Director of Research for the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Oklahoma, School of Community Medicine in Tulsa. She received her medical degree from the University of Nebraska. She simultaneously received her master of clinical research degree while completing her fellowship in Female Pelvic Medicine and Reconstructive Surgery at the Oregon Health and Sciences University.
Dr. Jameca Price, MD
Shari graduated from Oklahoma City Community College with her ADN in May 1993.
Upon graduation, Shari began her nursing career at Norman Regional Hospital and Baptist Medical Center as an Oncology Nurse. Additionally, she worked as a clinic nursefor Digestive Disease Specialist at Baptist Medical Center until 1999.
In July 1999, she began her Correctional Nursing career with the Oklahoma Department of Corrections at Mabel Bassett Correctional Center. There she worked as a staff nurseuntil May 2002, when she was promoted to Nurse Manager.
Her next promotion came in January 2007, where she moved to Medical Administration in Oklahoma City as a Nurse Manager. Her duties included ensuring infection control standards were met statewide, coordination and tracking of statewide TB testing,conducting quarterly performance improvement audits & managing telemedicine clinics via OUMC. Additionally, she assisted multiple facilities as acting Health ServicesAdministrator and Nurse Manager.
When COVID emerged in March 2020, she was appointed to the ODOC COVID team, guiding facilities and staff statewide with isolation/quarantine procedures, infection control practices and testing recommendations. She worked closely with the Oklahoma State Department of Health Epidemiologists, including weekly meetings to assess situations at affected facilities. She continues in this role today.
In April 2022, she accepted her current role as the Chief Administrator of Nursing. Sheis responsible for directing the provision of treatment care as the final nursing authority and ensures coordination and provision of comprehensive nursing services are delivered 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. She directly supervises 6 Nurse Managers and indirectly is responsible for all nursing staff employed by the Oklahoma Department of Corrections.
SHARI JONES, RN
Executive Team
ASHLEE BARR | CHAIR
KESSA LOVELADY | VICE-CHAIR
Outreach Committee
Claire Abbott and Emily Taylor | Co-Chairs
Committee: Emma Kasahara, Houston Hardman, Lara Colby, Kiki Greene, Onain Zahid, Fawaaz Hameed, Annie Marie Nguyen, Emma Harper, Nicole Pelletier, Luke Hamar, Samantha Perry
Logistics Committee
Riley Stayton and Cole McDonald | Co-Chairs
Committee: Adam Hassoun, Karli Spann, Kieran Raj, Chase Calkins, Anthony Hui, Julie Hodgden, Johnathan Huff, Damien Stoltz, Anusha Gopalam, Zachary Powell, Justin Stonecipher, Zane Nassar
Speakers Committee
Melissa Eldredge and Emily Tran | Co-Chairs
Committee: Paige McGuire, Evie Mitchell, Amanda Pan, Tate Atkinson, Sarah Power, Nicole Mountz, Tu Doan, John Walker Sacco, Eric Sarani, Sydney Vu
Marketing Committee
BreAnna Le and Amy Tan | Co-Chairs
Committee: Alison hunt, Taraneh Fazel, Canisia Tatah, Jarret Garbrecht, Husayn Ramji, Mellisa Xie, Carly Driskill, Deena Doan, Emily Markum
Health Fair Committee
Kessa Lovelady and Grace Mendros-Ruffner | Co-Chairs
Committee: Kayli Janda, Hudia Jamshed, Ritu Shah, Dani Harris, Jack Wood, Supriya Kohli, Grace Brennan, Zhennan Zhong, Sarah Kenney, Sydney Verrett
Fundraising Committee
Sully Marks and Jake Neighbors | Co-Chairs
Committee: Kristen Speer, Trey Gradnigo, Hope Ogbeide, Brasen Raney, Cierra Bennett, Luke Hamar, Rachel Abraham, Noah DeMoss, William Gathright, Jordan Zimmerman, Sam Adu-Lartey
Committees composed of students from University of Oklahoma College of Medicine and College of Public Health
