Cultural Influences Healthcare Perceptions

Although the caring act of nursing has not changed, the attitude and approach to the practice must be adjusted to meet the current health care needs. At the present time, care providers are not only faced with the challenge of providing quality and efficient care, but also, the issues of communicating with patients of various cultures. Even with several resources and guidelines available to clinicians, in the real-time setting, nurses, with their hurried tasks, often resort to stereotyping, feeling incompetent to offer holistic care to cultural groups. In order to meet the needs of a multicultural population, nurses must have useful parameters they can readily apply at the bedside to be able to provide a quality,

It is important for policy makers to create services that are culturally sensitive since the United States is a culturally diverse country; moreover, Healthcare professionals needs to be culturally competent so that they can guide policy makers in making sustainable systems for individual communities. “Efforts to improve cultural competence among health care professionals and organizations would contribute to improving the quality of health care for all consumers” (GeorgeTown Health Policy Institutes, 2004, para 31). Language barrier is another culture issue that prevents the community from getting the care that they deserve. “Cultural and language differences and socioeconomic status interact with and contribute to low health literacy, defined as the inability to understand or act on medical/therapeutic instructions” (Shaw, Huebner, Armin, Orzech, & Vivian, 2009, p.1). There should be health policy addressing this issue because of the confusion and inappropriate treatment that many

The text list several factors that contribute to healthcare disparities, social, economic status, access to medical care, lack of insurance, unemployment, lack of knowledge of healthcare processes and procedures within society, transportation issues and many other factors that contribute to healthcare disparities. Being knowledgeable of cultural competency has several advantages, cultural competence provides relief to the patient when the patient feels comfortable with their physician a bond is developed and patients are less likely to file malpractice claims. Displaying cultural competency increases the quality of services and patient satisfaction.

Health care disparities in the United States occur on the provider level. The implicit biases providers are susceptible to help shape physician behavior and produce differences in medical treatment across a host of demographic characteristics but mainly along the lines of race and ethnicity. This paper focuses mainly on the relationship between providers and Black Americans. There is a complex and historical relationship between providers and Black Americans which dates back to the 16th century that is the basis for the biases physicians exhibit towards this particular minority group in today’s healthcare system. Contrary to popular belief, the Tuskegee Syphilis Study in 1932 is not the forerunner to a host of medical abuses committed against

As the diverse populations of the United States (U.S.) continues to grow the need for cultural competency in healthcare delivery requires culturally competent healthcare providers. Each population has its own particular norms and practices that guide their lifestyles; therefore, a challenge arises for health care providers to learn to provide culturally sensitive care to clients from diverse cultural backgrounds (Waite and Calamaro 2010). The ever changing population of the U.S. signifies a much needed change in health care delivery to different cultures. The U.S. Bureau of Census (1992) predicts that by the year 2020 only 53 % of the population will be of white European decent.

The Chinese have a wonderful culture filled with beauty, strength, skill, and putting their family and society over their own wants. Sometimes it may be hard to understand why this culture or any other ethnic group pick choices that are different from ours but as future health care workers, an understanding of cultural beliefs does improve the relationship between worker and patient. For example, the concept of respect for authority or those older than you is one that all follow even if they are only American-born Chinese. When treating a sick Chinese elder, health care workers need to consider the possibility of a patient not informing the family of personal illness or an objection to put their elders in long-term cares. Healthcare workers may have to at times converse with only the males in the family because traditionally, the decision makers in a Chinese family are usually the males and the woman must go to them before choosing any type of medical treatment. Lastly, a Chinese patient may usually nod their head in agreement and, to a healthcare professional in the U.S, this means that they are receiving the information we are communicating to them. But what the patient is really doing is being polite and agreeing to what you are saying yet not retaining the information at all. Thus a doctor may need to address this issue a few days after the visit in order to not scare the patient away but instead encourage questions and make sure the information about their health

Overall, the health of Americans has improved over the past several decades. However, there is still an inconsistency between the health of various racial groups, minorities, and Caucasians (Cook, Kosoko-Lasaki, & O'Brien, R., 2005). Bakullari et al. (2014) report that specific research related to patient safety and racial and ethnic differences in HAIs is also lacking. As a result of these discrepancies, Bakullari et al. (2014) implemented a study to determine the rate and occurrence of HAIs in six specific racial/ethnic groups (white non-Hispanic, black non-Hispanic, Asian, Hispanic, Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, and other). What they found was that Hispanic and Asian populations had a significantly higher occurrence of HAIs than white non-Hispanic populations (Bakullari et al., 2014).

I hope that with my personal beliefs and culture that I will be able to give exceptional care to those whose cultures differ from my own. I am very much a people pleaser and I would try my best to keep everyone happy and comfortable. I think that this comes from my culture of being a millennial. While I am not necessarily knowledgeable about other culture’s practices, rituals, and beliefs, I would try my best to make sure that my patients were taken care of in a manner that protects their health and respects their culture, religion, or race.

Going to a different country or area of the world can open up anybody’s eyes to see that culture makes a huge impact on the understanding and practices of healthcare that seem to be so common to other areas of the world. When a person lives in one country their whole life, that person may not realize how different the life they live is from someone in a foreign country. If a person is going to receive treatment from someone with a different cultural background, they should be expected to get treatment to respects their own culture. Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences having such a diverse variety of students has their own cultural competency definition that states “effectively and comfortably communicate across cultures

It is significant for the medical provider to note that each individuals have their own cultural preferences of interactions and roles. The Native People have their own social customs; however some of these are typecasts and might not be as shared and many of the medical provider are familiar with those of their persons. Demonstrate great respect to the elderly. In several cases the elders are not familiarized to the new healthcare facilities, the new environments and noises, the caregivers and types treatment; for various of them it might be their first visit to a medical facility, it is significant to ease their awareness and explicate procedures thoroughly. The Silence is respected and is not certainly a negative behavior. Occasionally the

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.

Cultures I identify with are I am a female, Slovenian, German, Catholic individual. However, the main culture I identify with is the nursing culture. It’s essential we as nurses, focus on holistic care. This assignment assisted me in completing that; as I was able to learn about my patient’s background and the culture that they grew up in.

Cultural flaws that are within the healthcare community have increased and are increasingly showing up. This has been seen as excessive mental attitude, decreased respect for healthcare consumers and their right to participate in choices regarding their care and compliance regarding poor practice. These factors contribute to an image that leads the general public to believe that most doctors place their own interest first before considering the patient’s needs.

“Demographics of the US population have changed dramatically in the last three decades. These changes directly impact the healthcare industry in regard to the patients we serve and our workforce” (Borkowski, 2012). In fact, Voutsas (2011) argues that the U.S workforce is the most demographically heterogeneous workforce in the world and he believes that this is due to major changes and diversity .Borkowski (2012) also states that the significant changes in the US populations has been seen greatly in regards to gender, age ,and race and ethnicity .

The approach that I found to be more interesting was the cultural approach. This approach focuses on the ideas, beliefs, and values of a group when it pertains to this group's health, such as ways of explaining diseases and fighting them off. Within this approach there are different sectors that medical anthropologist can look into such as belief and ethnomedical systems, social construction of illness, healers, etc. What I found to be interesting is the aspect of healers within different cultures and the social construction of illness. I had a brief understanding that some cultures practiced differently than what I am used too, but I never understood how. For people who live in the United States when they have a cold they go to doctor who