CINCINNATI — Families of former inmates and researchers are trying to get a mental health illness named a public health crisis.

What You Need To Know

  • Researchers at the University of Cincinnati are working on a study that surrounds Post incarceration syndrome or PICS 

  • Researchers are trying to get more friends, families and former inmates to participate in the four-year study 

  • They hope to use the information to get PICS named a public health crisis and lobby for more funding for support programs to help

For years Chazidy Robinson said she was bogged down by prison walls that you can’t see.

“My life revolved around him so much, in eight that years, all I did was answer phone calls, did things that he needed for me to do,” said Robinson. 

It was her then husband who was locked up, but she said she was feeling the impact when he got out.

“I was becoming very aggressive in my speech, the way I talked to people, things that I said feeling like everybody was against me or feeling like I couldn’t trust people and I was never like that before because I self isolated,” said Robinson.

Now divorced, she’s on a new mission, to send a warning about what she went through. She said she had symptoms of a little known mental health disorder.

“People are being diagnosed to right now by a therapist, by a social worker, by a psychologist, because you’re saying they have PTSD. No, I don’t, I have post incarceration syndrome,” said Robinson.

Post incarceration syndrome or PICS became the focus of a new idea that she brought to the University of Cincinnati. She went straight to researcher and associate professor in the college of medicine, Rachael Nolan.

Together they got to work on a study on former inmates, their families and those symptoms of PICS.

“These things are like self isolation, putting their back against the wall, checking behaviors,” said Nolan. “Currently, we found that there is obviously a high incidence of PICS.”

She said they’re trying to get more families into the four-year study and use that information to get PICS named a public health crisis.

“When racism was declared a public health crisis, we had a lot of programs, a lot of funding, a lot of opportunities went up to really help address this within society, the same thing needs to happen here,” said Nolan.

It’s all an effort to recognize a mental illness that goes beyond prison.

“I want people to understand that there is light at the end of the tunnel and I know there are millions of people just like me,” said Robinson.

Those interested in the PICS can fill out online forms to learn more about the 12-week program or to volunteer with the SOAR 4031 Foundation.