Cultural Competency Analysis

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

The EYLF proposes that cultural competency cannot be mastered but is something educators continually strive for; by respecting, understanding, engaging with and positively acknowledging and teaching cultural diversity within the childcare industry.

The United States is a country that is the home to many people who are from various cultures, races and religion. Differences in people can cause misunderstanding and conflicts. It therefore becomes clear why all healthcare professionals should become culturally competent by having awareness, knowledge and skills for their patient whose beliefs and values are different. If health care professions are not culturally competent, then they will fail their patients in numerous ways. The book titled The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman portray how healthcare professionals lack cultural competency when working with the Lee family.

Cultural competency is becoming essential in American healthcare with the increasing and diversification of immigration. The Department of Homeland Security, 2014 statistics indicates over 750,000 immigrants received naturalization in the US. These naturalized citizens represent over 20 countries varying from Hispanic, Indian, Asian, African, and Middle Eastern cultures. A change in the way American healthcare treats these cultures is necessitated to provide efficient care and achieve positive outcomes. Douglas et al. (2014) guidelines are to empower patients to help diminish the inequities of their own healthcare. The guidelines for culturally competent care are meant to guide the nurse, nurse educators, and nurse managers in their competent treatment of persons of other cultures. These guidelines mandate a nurse use education, self-assessment and reflection, and diversification of the workforce to meet the demands. The ten guidelines are knowledge of culture, education and training in culturally competent care, critical reflection, cross-cultural communication, culturally competent practice, cultural competence in health care systems and organizations, patient advocacy and empowerment, multicultural workforce, cross-cultural leadership, and evidence-based practice and research.

For my cultural competence paper, I attended a Narcotics Anonymous (NA) meeting. The meeting was held at the First United Methodist Church in Mechanicsburg on Wednesday, February 15th at 7:30 p.m. and lasted about one hour. Prior to attending the meeting, I was incredibly nervous and I did not know what to expect. The purpose of the assignment was meant for us to step out of our comfort zone and explore something that we have never done before and I thought that attending the meeting would be a perfect fit. I have never attended a NA meeting prior to this assignment nor did I have a specific reason to.

I would use my culture competence skills to assist in being effective with working Andre and other clients as well because this is a set of skills, values and principles that professional must acknowledge while working or interacting with different culture groups and ethnic groups. Having knowledge about the different populations that you may come into contact with will help you efficiently and respectfully interact with clients from diverse backgrounds.

I just had a conversation with Dr. Mark Gooden over in the college of education. Dr. Gooden is the person I reached out to regarding the cultural competency training for the updates. I will talk to Mike and Alexandra about what I learned. I think it will be a good addition to the week, but I need to try to make it work with the schedule – he needs a minimum of about three hours, but I think we can fit it in. Dr. Gooden’s research is actually in this area and he does this training across the state and nationally for school districts, principals, and other businesses. He’s willing to do it as part of his “service to UT” but he did ask if, in lieu of a payment he would typically charge for this kind of training, if we would be willing

I would have to rate our school between cultural precompetence and cultural competence depending on the year in question and even the time of year. We are aware that we have achievement gaps in our minority populations, particularly our African American and special education students. When test scores come back and we see the lack of progress for these special groups, we have meetings and provided professional development on differentiation and small group instruction. Only one year did I participate in a professional development where an expert on teaching African American led the discussion. Usually staff development sessions are more generalized.

While examining the life of the Lee family, it was easy to identify that Hmong culture is much different than Western culture today. The Lee’s faced many adversities that not only affect their lives but the life of their ill daughter Lia. By analyzing culture, stigma, prevention, and implications, one can begin to see how the Hmong culture collides in the care of Lia.

According to Sandau-Beckler (2001), the ability to evaluate relatives is of the utmost importance in “family centered services” (p. 93). Fong (2001) maintained that in the past family centered services evaluations were simplistic. Therefore, she recommended extensive modifications to become consistent with the increasingly diverse population in American. Moreover, she highlighted that “culturally competent assessments” should mirror the morals and assets in combination with obstacles of the customer’s background. She defines cultural competence as a practitioner’s capability to concurrently evaluate issues utilizing myriad approaches and proposing ethnically appropriate solutions to the customer.

Life experience coupled with professional experience has enriched the level of cultural competency that I function at daily. Starting my first career in the legal arena, almost twenty years ago, I carried more bias toward certain groups, often thinking in black and white rather than a rich rainbow of grays. Being empathetic to individuals that committed crimes against society and others was rarely accepted in my naïve viewpoint. After my first year of working with criminal clients, I began to understand that one simple act cannot define or give explanation to the beauty of multiple stories that fill the chapters in an individual’s life. I learned that I could not fully understand what led to the story that was playing out before me without

Cultural Competency Cultural competence is a system of corresponding behaviors and policies that enable professionals to efficiently work in cross-cultural situations. Three simple steps can achieve an equitable system that can be applied to any situation; knowledge of the client’s culture, acceptance of the client’s belief, and development of skills in inclusion. Each step cumulates to properly address a cross-cultural situation, such as adoption, or placing a child within a foster home. Adopting a child from a foreign country can lead to hindrances in the child’s development, as their culture should be celebrated and not bypassed for assimilation into a new culture and home. According to National Association of Social Workers (NASW), “Social workers should understand culture and its functions in human behavior and society, recognizing the strengths that exist in all cultures.”

Cultural competency can be viewed as an ongoing journey of commitment and active engagement through the process of cultural awareness, knowledge, skills and cultural encounter (Coolen, 2012).Trust is the underlying purpose behind cultural competency in the development of health care provider and patient relationship. Health care professionals need to become more sensitive, respectful and attentive to the patients cultural beliefs and practices. Self-awareness is particularly important when communicating where barriers exists, unconscious prejudices may hinder the successful building of therapeutic relationships. In order to provide culturally sensitive pain management, a patients pain must be considered within the context of the individual’s

It is important to first define cultural competency, as the ability for health professionals to work in situations where their personal culture may not be identical to that of the patient they are interacting with (Blackburn, 2015). Unfortunately, there is no definitive definition utilized across professions (Suarez-Balcazar et al., 2011). This can make it difficult to pursue in both teaching it and evaluating it. In fact, this study will only touch on one method of evaluating cultural competence with three subscores: awareness, organization, and skills (Suarez-Balcazar et al., 2011). This is not the only way to interpret and evaluate the particular realm of competence however, as there was yet another method of evaluation using five subsets: awareness/sensitivity, behaviors, patient-centered communication, practice orientation, and self-assessment (Schwarze, Witte, Sellers, Luzadis, Weiner, Domingo-Snyder, & Page Jr., 2015). This poses a solution to the lack of cultural competency and awareness; however the discord between methods of evaluation can also pose a problem with consistency.

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.