This summer, some female inmates at Utah State Prison in Draper are cutting down on calories and strapping on their sneakers to try to shed some extra pounds.  Believe it or not, a hefty portion of the inmate population there is overweight.

The facility's pilot weight-loss program kicked off three weeks ago with the goal of helping incarcerated women trim down by downsizing their meals, giving them some extra exercise and teaching them the basics about nutrition.

Obesity has become a hot topic in the news and in literature in the U.S.  Because the problem so widely affects society, corrections is not immune to it, said Utah Department of Corrections Medical Director Rich Garden.

"I don't know if it's a corrections issue, rather than a national problem," Garden said.  "[Because it impacts society at large], it makes sense that obesity would impact the incarcerated population, as well."

To get an idea of how the issue affects inmates in Utah, Garden talked with some medical providers in the state to find out what their experiences have been with offenders and obesity, anecdotally.  The consensus was that many inmates tend to gain weight after they become incarcerated and the data supports that fact.

According to Garden, male inmates in Utah gain an average of 34 pounds within their first year of incarceration, while their female counterparts add on an average of 17 pounds during their first year behind bars.

The driving forces behind this weight gain are a high calorie diet and a lack of exercise, Garden said.

"For the most part, people are less active once they arrive at prison," said Garden.  "Prison is sedentary."

In addition, the DOC serves 2,700 calories worth of meals to inmates each day, regardless of their gender or size, when the Food and Drug Administration recommends a daily caloric intake of only 2,000.

"We basically provide the same number of calories to people that might be 4'8" and weigh 100 pounds or 6'8" and weigh 350 pounds," said Garden.  "We are actually providing them with an overabundance of calories."

While providing inmates with hearty meals and keeping them full is a tactic for custody staff, who find that inmates are generally happier and easier to manage when they are well-fed, Gardner said that it, at the same time, causes inmates to gain weight and become unhealthy.

At intake, 73 percent of people are overweight and 20 percent are obese, according to Gardner.  After three months of incarceration, those percentages jump to 80 and 43, respectively, he said.

With numbers like that, Gardner and other medical staff in Utah saw a need for an intervention.  But, first, they distributed a survey to 288 male and female inmates at Draper to determine if they would be interested in learning more about nutrition and slimming down.

According to Garden, 90 percent of the women who responded to the survey and 80 percent of the men said that they would enjoy more exercise and education about living a healthy lifestyle.  And more than half of the respondents said that they would opt for a lower calorie diet, if special trays with reduced portions were available for them during meal times.

Since the response from the inmates was so positive, a weight loss pilot program was born.  To start out, it was first offered to only female inmates on a voluntary basis.

The 30 women who signed up for the program agreed to meet three times a week for half an hour of education and discussion and another 30-45 minutes of exercise, such as jogging, push-ups or sit-ups.  They were allowed to have family members bring sneakers in to them at the facility or to purchase a pair from the commissary, Garden said.
 
Garden explained women who are not incarcerated have a variety of places to turn for help losing weight, like Weight Watchers, but those organizations do not exist behind bars.

"[The inmates] have no options and we are simply trying to provide them with an option," said Garden.

Draper's pilot program follows the Weight Watchers model, where women weigh in once a week, have discussions about weight loss strategies and lean on each other for support.

"For the most part it's been a very good program in terms of camaraderie," said Garden, noting that the women have been a great source of support for each other. 

He added that once a month, a dietician meets with them to talk about nutrition.

Giving these women information about healthy eating and an opportunity to try to lose weight is a benefit to both the inmates and the DOC, Gardner said.

"It really boils down to the fact that this is preventative medicine," said Gardner.

For the department, he said, a program like this can cut down on inmate healthcare costs for problems related to obesity - like coronary artery disease and diabetes - and it can reduce the amount of money spent on food, if portions are decreased. 

And the program requires no additional funding, Garden explained.  There is no special food served or additional staff required; program participants eat the same food as other inmates, just less of it, and existing employees have put in a bit more time to accommodate the program, he said.

"The benefit of this is that this is not an expensive endeavor whatsoever," Garden said.  "And the benefits, in terms of cost and human health, are absolutely tremendous."

For the inmates, losing weight can help improve their self-esteem, which may translate into more success in society once they are released, he said.

"That is really our hope, but we won't know all these things until we get some time under our belt," Garden said.

In August, Garden said that he and his colleagues will sit down, tally the results of the program and see what sort of progress the women have made.

"[We'll] talk to the [women] that participated and see how maybe we can tweak the program, how we can do things better," said Garden.

At that point, they'll take that data to the administration to discuss expanding the program, he said.

"We are excited about it.  We think it's a great idea," said Garden.  "It's certainly a program whose time is long overdue."

Resources:

Garden rgarden@utah.gov