Cultural Differences, Health Care and Language

“Americans can take come pride in the fact that attaining what the medical profession calls “cultural competency” is a goal of most health care institutions. However, achieving this goal in today’s health care environment, filled with diverse patient and provider populations, is no easy task. American hospitals are increasingly being staffed by and serving diverse populations. This creates the ideal breeding ground for conflict and misunderstanding among the staff and inferior patient care” (Galanti, 2011). To gain a more thorough understanding of this concept, I will be giving four examples or viewpoints that are completely different, when looking at the Hispanic belief against the Native American point of view.

In 1988 Giger and Davidhizar created their Transcultural Assessment Model (TAM) to facilitate “…the discovery of culturally sensitive facts… (and) provide culturally appropriate and competent care.” (Giger & Davidhizar, 2002) The TAM was developed for an undergraduate nursing curriculum to train students to assess and provide care for patients that are culturally diverse. This paper will employ the six cultural phenomena defined by TAM to assist in identifying cultural attributes of Mexican Americans that should be considered by nurses in assessment and care.

Mexican-American culture has been characterized as a family-focused, community-oriented culture. Even second and third-generation Mexican-Americans place a higher value upon their relationships with others versus personal autonomy, in contrast with the dominant values of the United States. Living in extended family situations, or being influenced by extended family is much more common in Mexican culture than in other cultures. The core values of Mexican culture are said to be "familismo, personalismo, and respeto. Familismo involves placing the family ahead of individual interests, living near extended family, making collective decisions that involve one or more members of the family, and feeling responsible for and obligated to the family...Personalismo involves the building and valuing of interpersonal relationships...Respeto refers to the high regard for family and community members, especially for authority figures and the elderly" (Neff, Brabeck, Kearney 2006).

Latinos, collectively the nation's largest minority group, vary substantially in terms of socioeconomic and legal status, their country of origin and the extent of ongoing contact with that country, their region of residence within the United States, their generation status and levels of acculturation, and psychosocial factors (Elder, Ayala, Parra-Medina, & Talavera, 2009). Due to these various issues navigating the health care system can prove difficult especially when it comes to the end of life care, it is prevalent in the Mexican culture for the elderly to be taken care of by their younger family members such as their children. However, if they have a major illness or the family simply don’t have the ability to take care of them anymore

In the Hispanic culture health care is most commonly sought only after symptoms appear. In many cases only when those symptoms cause the individual’s incapacitation. Working through discomfort is considered the norm, dwelling on discomfort or mild pain is seen as weakness and seeking medical attention when not ill, such as preventive care, is almost unheard of.

There are eight philosophical concepts that have a huge influence on the Latinos perspective of medical beliefs. One of these eight philosophical concepts deals with the concept that “The mind and body are inseparable,” which is one of the major causes of illness and death. The Latinos belief that, any kind of illness associated with the physical and emotional being, is the result of having experienced strong emotional state because of rage (rabia) and retaliation fantasies associated with rage, and one suffers from bilis.(Maudro) Other illnesses cause includes fear, envy, rage and painful loss, which causes physical symptoms. Another of the philosophical concepts includes the “Balance and Harmony Are Important.”

No culture is growing at a faster pace than the Hispanic population, surpassing African Americans as the largest minority population in the United States. The Hispanic population increased from 35.3 million to 50.5 million in 2010. The intention of this paper is to increase the awareness and understanding of cultural competency and cultural sensitivity toward the Hispanic culture. Cultural competency cannot be overemphasized as it plays an imperative role in the quality of care that is given to different cultures. A culturally insensitive encounter can lead to

Hispanics have various origins and come from different areas of the world. Whether it’s language, food, music, beliefs, or traditions, Hispanic culture is spreading across the nation and making an impact on our country as a whole. The Giger and Davidhizar Transcultural Model was developed in 1988. It is a way for nursing students to learn to assess and provide care for patients that were culturally diverse. The model includes six cultural phenomena: communication, time, space, social organization, environmental control, and biological variations. These provide a framework for patient assessment, and assist in competent culturally sensitive care in the medical field. In our presentation, we will discuss some of the key characteristics of Hispanic

I chose this article because I find it interesting and of great help to any nursing and health care professional; I am Hispanic myself and constantly looking for better ways to help my community. I personally see my grandmother struggling whenever she needs to see her physician, as she sometimes does not understand what him and his staff are telling her. On another note nursing is an ever changing career and the Hispanic culture is growing at an enormous rate, becoming culturally competent does not only provide the patient with good care but can make the nurses’ job easier and more rewarding. I do feel that there should be more research on this subject; the best way to learn about a patient’s cultural beliefs is to ask the patient. I think that the population that the author intended to target is health care professionals; however, I know that any immigrant can benefit from reading this article.

To understand this dynamic, one should look into the family relationships in the culture. The Mexican culture is usually very family-oriented, with the male as the patriarch and the female filling a more subservient role. Traditionally, the family is involved in the decision making of an individual, however, with the merging of different cultures this may be different. As a nurse, you should always take a moment and ask the patient how decisions are made in their family, and proceed accordingly. (Guarnero, 2005).

The number of people nationwide needing language assistance is growing rapidly, and individuals with these needs interact with the health care system daily. A growing literature documents a link between language barriers and poor quality health care that can lead to lower health status. Research also indicates that this link can be broken by the use of interpreters. Language barriers prevent providers from obtaining accurate patient histories, impair the ability to engage patients in joint patient-provider decision-making on treatment, and limit patients' ability to obtain sufficient information for self-care . Poor patient-provider communication has been linked, for example, to poor asthma management practices in children and

Professional communication has been regarded as a fundamental discipline among all professions, which entails the skill of communicating effectively and sensitively. The purpose of this paper is to acquire extensive knowledge about the importance of professional and effective communication in the delivery of health care in various cultural groups. This writer selected the Latino population as her journal reading, since Latinos have become frequent patients in the acute care hospital. Through this reading, exploring the culture of Latinos will augment insights to the delivery of care that is culturally sensitive. Furthermore, the importance of cultural competence in nursing facilitates

Healthcare in the United States of America is an ever increasing field of diversity. Many healthcare workers are uneducated in diversity, resulting in insufficient patient care. As a result patients from different backgrounds do not receive proper treatment, and refuse to seek medical attention, or are over charged for simple procedures. Educating healthcare workers is the key to decreasing unnecessary physician visits as well as providing patients with the sense of understanding and respect regarding their health decisions. The preceding information will provide a brief overview of Leinigner’s Model of Culture Care Theory, Leinigner’s theory applied to the Colombian Culture for medical professionals, feelings about access to health care, barriers in healthcare, alternative medicine and food preferences.

Professional communication has been regarded as a fundamental discipline among all professions, which entails the skill of communicating effectively and sensitively. The purpose of this paper is to acquire extensive knowledge about the importance of professional and effective communication in the delivery of health care in various cultural groups. This writer selected the Latino population as her journal reading, since Latinos have become frequent patients in the acute care hospital. Through this reading, exploring the culture of Latinos will augment insights to the delivery of care that is culturally sensitive. Furthermore, the importance of cultural competence in nursing facilitates effective delivery of utmost care to diverse patients based on their cultural and linguistic needs.

Cultural sensitivity in health care is a very important component that helps health care providers to give the best care according to the patient`s cultural background and needs. Being cultural sensitivity does not just mean giving medications and helping them physically, but it goes beyond that. Communicating with them in a manner that they will understand well and respond appropriately is very vital. For example, in Hispanic or African culture, talking to somebody looking straight into their eyes is very rude. But in American culture, it is interpreted differently. So, when taking care of patients like these, we should be very cautious because they will think of you as being mean and rude. “The key is to remember the patient`s cultural behaviors are relevant to health assessment and should be considered when planning care” (Barker & DeNisco, p.574, 2016). As I have worked with a lot of Hispanic patients for so many years, I have been motivated to learn more about them now. They are many behaviors that need to be put into consideration as these patients are being taken care of. Most people I work with misinterpret them as being rude but that is the way they talk or communicate. “May communicate intense emotion and appear quite animated in conversations a behavior that is sometimes misinterpreted by non-Hispanics as being “out-of-control.” (Nursing 322, p.18,2010). They are many other behaviors that they exhibit which help me