Cultural Competence In Health Care

“Health is influenced by culture and beliefs” (NRS-429V, 2011, p. 1). In order for the nurse to properly care for the patient, she must know and understand the patient’s culture. “Cultural care is a comprehensive model that includes the assessment of a client’s cultural needs, beliefs, and health care practices” (NRS-429V, 2011, p. 1). It is not enough to just know where the patient lives or where he came from. The nurse must embrace the concept of cultural competence and cultural awareness. This requires not only the awareness of the cultural beliefs and values of their patients, but also

Cultural competency aids in closing the “disparities gap” in health care. ("OMH," 2012, para. 2) In doing so, health professionals and their clients are better able to discuss concerns without cultural differences getting in the way of effective communication and problem solving. Being respectful of and sensitive to the client’s health beliefs, culture, values, and diverse needs can bring positive outcomes within treatment and patient care. After all, is it not the main job of the health care provider to ensure patient trust? Open forms of communication when dealing with client issues can only be provided if the patient is comfortable with his provider and believes his

Critically analyse one of the main challenges, barriers, and enablers for cultural competence in health care when working in a cross-cultural environment.

Cultural competence can be defined as using the ability of one’s awareness, attitude, knowledge and skill to effectively interact with a patient’s many cultural differences. Madeline Leininger, a pioneer on transcultural nursing describes it this way; “a formal area of study and practice focused on comparative human-care differences and similarities of the beliefs, values and patterned lifeways of cultures to provide culturally congruent, meaningful, and beneficial health care to people” (Barker, 2009, p. 498). The importance of cultural diversity in healthcare allows for the delivery of appropriate cultural autonomy. Showing respect for others will lead to trust between nurse and

Cultural competency is the capacity of people or services to include ethnic/cultural considerations into all aspects of their work related to health promotion, disease prevention and other and other healthcare interventions (Cultural competence is important for several reasons, (Purnell, 2008a).First, it can contribute in the development of culturally sensitive practices which can reduce barriers that effect treatment in healthcare settings. Second, it can promote understanding, which is detrimental in cultural competence assessment, to know whom, the individuals known as the primary care provider and whom they view as the primary healer, can attribute to the promotion of trust and increase the person’s interest in participating

Cultural competence in health care describes the ability to provide care to patients with diverse values, beliefs and behaviors, including tailoring health care delivery to meet patients’ social, cultural and linguistic needs. The need for healthcare systems to increase cultural competence and personalize care for ethnic patient minorities should not be ignored. Healthcare systems should promote better understanding and communication between diverse ethnic patients and caregivers. Hospitals should design a system that caters to the needs of all the populations they serve and not just apply a one-size-fits-all approach. Becoming a culturally competent health care organization is a critical component in reducing health care disparities.

Culture has more than one definition. It can be defined as the language spoken throughout a group of people or even the beliefs practiced. In the professional field of nursing, nurses are required to do more than administer medication or change bandages on a patient. To be able to fulfill a nurse’s job requirements, a nurse must learn to be culturally competent. Cultural competency in the professional field of nursing means to care and respect the patient whether or not the health care provider is in agreement with the patient’s decisions.

Miscommunication, medication errors, and lack of compliance commonly occur in the healthcare field. These are just a few of the errors that occur due to the patient being from a different culture than the physician or healthcare worker. Those three errors alone have a huge impact on our healthcare today. If we could have a better understanding of other cultures that are different from our own we could have a dramatic decrease in errors and a great increase in healthcare participation. Training must be completed and must be done in more than one way. The first step is to make sure that all physicians and health care workers get the same nationwide training that focuses on improving cultural competence. How this is completed must be done in more than one way (Horwitz, 2001).

As a health care professional, we are faced with caring for patients of different cultural and ethnic background. Researching and learning about the patient’s culture values, beliefs and practices is essential and remarks the ability to provide quality health care for the patient. “Organizations and individuals who understand their clients’ cultural values, beliefs, and practices are in a better position to be coparticipants with their clients in providing culturally acceptable care” (Purnell & Paulanka, 2008, p. 2). After completing the cultural competence checklist, I was able to identify some of my responses to the patient cultural values and belief practices. I will describe a summary of my assessment results, analyze

Cultural Competency can be described as one’s ability to learn about cultures other than their own. It speaks to the value one places on diversity and their desire to foster an open exchange of ideas between dissimilar cultures. While in a perfect world, cultural competency would be of heightened importance in all aspects of life, there are certain industries where cultural competency factor more heavily; one of those being health care. This is especially true in areas with increased diversities of cultures, ethnic groups and a variety of languages.

After watching the Cultural Competence in Health care video, I learned that there are many different people I will deal with in my career as an advocate for health. One quote I really liked from the video stated, “My diversity is my strength, not my weakness”. I believe this is true because having so many different people of different cultural backgrounds opens up the opportunity for different points of view to develop new ideas. This reminds me of the activity we did in class on our first day. We were asked to simply write down what our thoughts were. What we realized upon getting our sheets back is that when you work with others, they may have an idea you had not thought about. Overall, I think this video is a good representation of the

Encountering a fast growing aging nation, the U.S. government strives to create the cultural competence of medical care providers for this to lower health inequalities. The overall rising number of the older adult population exemplifies a cultural icon within itself. The proportion of older adults from ethnic and racial minority groups is projected to increase exponentially by 2050, with the largest growth rates being among Hispanics, followed by Asian-Pacific Islanders, American Indians, and African Americans. During the year of 2006, the U.S. Census Bureau stated that 19 percent of the U.S. population that is aged 65 years and older would be considered as a minority. In 2050, 39 percent of the countries older adults will be denoted by minority groups. For these predictions, organizations should incorporate community outreach. This will help in studying the population and learning who are the most efficient resource individuals within the ethnic groups. Also, they can predict the need and demand for alliances or affiliations so that when families get there, the health care organizations can be more organized and be prepared to give pertinent services and resources. Organizations can reach out to religious groups to help engage workers, trainers, or religious leaders who has a better understanding of the individual’s cultural back and they can also help in educating employees in the distinctions of working with them to display respect (Lehman, D., Fenza, P., &

In healthcare, virtue ethics (finding the proper end for humans and then seeking that end) is the most prominent theory health care professionals strive for in decision making (Furlong, B., & Morrison, E. E., 2014, p.5). Basically, virtue ethics is seeking the highest good for humans. But, unfortunately in the health care profession there will be some ethical dilemmas. For example, some treatments involve harm (we are to do harm) yet provide benefit (benefit only), health care professionals need to be able to explain the benefits and risk to gain the cooperation of patients for treatment (Furlong, B., & Morrison, E. E., 2014, p.12). Another, is taking away someone’s autonomy (the ability to decide for oneself, being free to make own decisions) due to a health care professional deems one to be incompetent (Furlong, B., & Morrison, E. E., 2014, p.11).

Ielee Valenzuela Nutr. 7 Sec 3004 The Importance of Cultural Competency In Healthcare Culture is one of the factors that distinguishes humans from other species in the world.

In any case, providing competent care to a patient of a different culture must first start with an understanding of the culture itself (Potter & Perry, 2011). Culture is