The Communication Approaches That The Nurse For Individuals Who Do Not Speak English As Their Primary Language

“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

Establishing effective communication with the patient is a critical factor in promoting patient quality care. Good communication is fundamental when providing safe and effective care at the beside in order to increase the quality of patient care. One of the many communicative barriers that exists between patients and the healthcare team are language barriers. Language barriers are considered an initial problem of translation or code-switching. Individuals who speak different languages require a certain code breaker in order to facilitate effective communication (Gregg & Saha, 2007). Furthermore, language barriers may hinder the quality of patient care and interfere with optimal clinical outcomes. According to Happ et al., 2011, nurses have the unique responsibility to engage in communication with patients and have control over the timing and method of communication. Evidenced based interventions such as communication boards are needed to improve nurses’ communication skills in order to achieve effective communication.

The term culture is defined as “the thoughts, communications, actions, customs, beliefs, values, and institutions of racial, ethnic, religious, or social groups” (Potter & Perry, 2013). With the increase of culturally diverse populations in the United States, it is important for nurses to practice cultural competence. Cultural competence is the ability to acquire specific behaviors, skills, attitudes, and policies in a system that permits “effective work in a cross-cultural setting” (OMH, 2013). Being culturally competent is essential because nurses who acknowledges and respects a patient’s health beliefs and practices are more likely to have positive health outcomes (OMH, 2012). Every culture has certain views and attitudes concerning

Can you imagine the how the healthcare industry would be without language, what seems to be impossible to imagine is the everyday reality of some patients because of their native language. Language is a major contribution to the health disparities that some populations face, because it makes it difficult for some patients to communicate their problems as well as understand the care they provided. Language contributes to the health disparities that some populations face because it creates a barrier between the patient and the care provider, making it difficult for a patient to receive proper care. Language barriers create a communication gap between a patient and a provider, forcing the patient to feel misunderstood and unable to trust his/her provider to properly care for them. I come from a family that speaks more than one language, so I have seen the impact language barriers can have on someone who doesn’t speak fluent English.

According to the 2011 U.S. Census, twenty-one percent of the population speaks other language at home besides English. Hence, one of the biggest challenges in Healthcare is the language barrier between the providers, Health care administrators and patients that speak foreign languages. This poses a challenge for medical entities,

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

In order to deliver nursing care to different cultures, nurses are expected to understand and provide culturally competent health care to diverse individuals. Culturally competent care is tailored to the specific needs of each client, while incorporating the individual’s beliefs and values (Stanhope & Lancaster, 2006, p. 90). By being culturally competent, nurses are able to help improve health outcomes by using cultural knowledge and specific skills in selecting interventions that are specific to each client (Stanhope & Lancaster). Therefore, nurses “should perform a cultural assessment on every client with whom they interact with” (Stanhope &

Adapting to different cultural beliefs and practices requires flexibility and a respect for others view points. Cultural competence means to really listen to the patient, to find out and learn about the patient's beliefs of health and illness. To provide culturally appropriate care we need to know and to understand culturally influenced health behaviors. However, becoming culturally competent is a much more daunting task. Culture (and ethnicity) often influences a patient’s perceptions of health and illness. Therefore, if healthcare providers appear insensitive to cultural diversity, their actions may negatively affect the quality of the healthcare that they provide.

With the large increase multicultural population in the United States, nurses encounter patients with differences in healthcare beliefs, values and customs. To provide adequate nursing care, nurses must be aware of these differences. They must respect and acknowledge the patient’s culture. To do this, nurses need education on cultural competence to ensure patient satisfaction and better patient outcomes.

Communication is any form of expressing and receiving of messages between individuals. The importance of Communication in the nursing profession is to maintain high quality care for the patient but also maintain effective collaboration between professionals. Boykins, D (2014) states that the “registered nurse is expected to communicate in various formats and in all areas of practice”. Various formats include speaking to patients and coworkers as well as utilizing appropriate protocols and systems to effectively communicate regards to patient’s status.

The purpose of effective communication in healthcare is to provide first-class medical care, minimal to no medical errors and have precision; and without it there is room for medical errors, poor patient care and an ineffective team that produces undesired outcome. In the professional and patient relationship, the lack of good communication causes the patient to be apprehensive in asking questions, to worry about being bothersome because they feel other patients are sicker, and there is an assumption that the patient does not have any concerns. There are barriers to communication that include only one between the sender and receiver of the message understands the message, cultural differences, and lack of education. In sending the message it is essential that the message is received with clarity, it is concise and complete. If the patient has a language barrier, it can be masked by the patient not responding to information and it is detected as a result of poor or no compliance. In literacy concerns, all information should be presented on a 5th grade level to aid in the comprehension of the information. The care of the patient should be patient/family centered which helps in detecting any language, cultural or literacy barriers (Schyve, 2007). For example, a 46 year old single male patient that is functionally literate is admitted with a diagnosis of acute angina. During the

I see many challenges in regards to providing care to patients that do not speak English especially in the healthcare realm. From the very beginning we need to know what is wrong, what happened, how long it has been going for, what medical history they have, allergies, and medication taken. How can we treat what we do not know is wrong? In order to probably do some root cause analysis you need to drill down and see what is going on, which cannot be done if you cannot communicate. Also, you do not know what I making things better. These non-English speaking individuals will have unmet needs because of my inability to

One of the greatest things about nursing is that we have the opportunity to share with different cultures and learn about them. Our patients are complex; they each have their religion, culture, and life choices. Delivering health advice and not knowing much about a patient’s cultural background will influence how the patient may perceive the nurses’ advice. The article that I did my research on was published in 2011, by Perez-Avila, Sobralske and Katz; the name of the article is “No Comprendo: Practice Considerations When Caring for Latinos With Limited English Proficiency in the United States Health Care System”. In the United States, Hispanics form the largest minority. Most of this community has limited English

It is important to approach the patient in the appropriate manner to prevent jeopardizing the nurse-patient relationship. The first step a nurse should take is to eliminate any communication barriers. Most Arabs can speak fluent English, but it may be necessary in some cases to facilitate an Arabic interpreter. The nurse should then document the interpreter as an intervention in the patient’s chart (Khalifa, 2012). In the case of the patient not speaking fluent English, the nurse should be aware of nonverbal cues and implement strategies to successfully

Nowadays, nurses not only need to know how to care of their patients, but they also must be able to care of patients from other cultures with many beliefs and values. Cultural views of individual influence the patient’s perception and decision of health and health care (Creasia & Parker, 2007). In order to care for people across different languages and cultures, nurses need to develop cultural sensitivity, knowledge, and skills.