In the coming decade, the increase in the number of older inmates will be a critical challenge for prison management. The economic costs of caring for an aging prison population is overwhelming. In addition, meeting the health care needs of this older incarcerated population will be hindered by a nationwide shortage of registered nurses. Prison management is faced with the difficult task of not only recruiting nurses but retaining them once they have been hired. Sources of stress, absenteeism, and turnover include multiple role conflicts such as custodial and treatment roles. They are expected to listen to and treat inmate patients and are also warned not to trust their patients. Correctional nurses are confronted with unruly and demanding patients. There is also a source of incompatible priorities and responsibilities between nurses and prison administrators. Administrators must be sensitive to issues larger than patient care. In the outside world, prison nurses face a stigma by association, negative labels applied to nurses who interact with and care for society’s “failures.” In addition, prison nurses are isolated by the very nature of their work. They are unable to interact with a variety of colleagues. To combat these concerns, prison nurses must be provided with comprehensive orientation to the environment in which they will work. To combat the stigma by association, nurses require reasons for why what they do is important for society. In addition, programs can be established to counter the problems of social isolation by mainly recognizing that geriatric prison nursing is a unique specialization. These ideas and suggestions are easy to implement requiring little time and expense and potentially increasing the stability of a work force of growing importance. References