Cultural Competency And Its Effectiveness Essay

Cultural competency is critical in psychology practice. In the United States, the groups, which considered as cultural and ethnic minorities, are growing in the population (APA, 2003). Culture often influences the content and quality of people’s experience, perception, and response. Thus, it is important for psychologists to be aware of cultural influences on client’s presenting experience(s) (Gardiner & Kosmitzki, 2010). Without a regard for cultural influence, there is a significant risk for the psychologist to misunderstand, misinterpret, and misguide his or her client. Such misunderstanding, misinterpretation, and misguidance are not only unhelpful but can be detrimental for the client (Corey, Corey, & Callanan, 2011; Pope, & Vasquez, 2011).

For this assignment, I have chosen to reflect on both my school site and the district.

It have been proven effective in providing services to individuals from a wide spread of diverse backgrounds. Cultural competence is understanding a set of congruent behaviors, knowledge, attitudes and policies that enable effective work in cross-cultural situations (Bazron, Cross, Dennis, & Isaacs, 1989). This means that an individual trains to understand different cultural groups. Cultural competency training is beneficial to all human service organizations because it aims to increase the knowledge and skills to improve one’s ability to efficiently serve different cultural groups therefore eliminating biases and

I have learned that it is important that educators  and health providers be trained on cultural competency to understand the population they are serving. Marks, Sims, and Osher (King, Sims, & Osher, n.d.) define cultural competency  as a set of congruent behaviors, attitudes, and policies that come together in a system, agency, or among professionals and enables that system, agency, or those professionals to work effectively in cross–cultural situations" ( as cited in Cross et al., 1989; Isaacs & Benjamin, 1991). Health providers and educators should investigate demographic patterns or trends in the place where they live and work. This brings awareness of the types of cultures that they might come across when they are working with people. Organizations should integrate and implement policies that promote the value of  diversity, self-assessment, manage the dynamics of difference, acquire and institutionalize cultural knowledge, and adapt to diversity and the cultural contexts of communities they serve (Georgetown  University, 2004). Georgetown University (2004) also stresses that culture competency grows gradually and is always open for improvement.

For us to develop cultural competence we need to have a level expertise, knowledge and attributes. When I mention Expertise I am referring to professional skills such as, being able to communicate correct information for culturally different people and their communities, the skill to candidly discuss racial and ethnic issues and to react to culturally based signs, the skill to understand the meaning that traditions/culture has for each person, Interviewing skills that help to understand and accommodate the role of language in a person’s culture and the skill to use the idea of empowerment on behalf of culturally different people and communities.

Cultural competency is a set of appropriate behaviours, attitudes and policies among professionals and enables them to work efficiently in cross-cultural situations (NCCC, 2006). A culturally competent health care system can eliminate cultural inequities, provide greater quality of care, and have less patient dissatisfaction and more positive health consequences. A conclusion reached in a study (Palafox et al., 2002) states, culture influences the outcome of medical examination and; therefore, it is vital to provide culturally competent health care services. Cultural competency is especially important in the context of radiographic examination due to the variety of culturally different patients a radiographer comes in contact. The following case study effectively highlights the impact of cultural competency.

In our today’s society, we are faced with multiple cultures that affect our ways of thinking, acting, and leaving. Cultural competency reflects one’s culture. Culture reflects the way the children are raised, their way of communicating, what is acceptable or not acceptable, the way they overcome challenges, their clothes, and how we go about medical treatment and so on. I know because I come from a very strong cultural background where it is considered bad to look at older people straight in the eyes while talking to them. Culture can be defined as “the learned and shared beliefs, values and life ways of a designated or particular group that are generally transmitted intergenerational and influence one’s thinking and action modes” (Leininger, 2002).

The progress I have made on building cultural competence is I met this guy while I was at work, and he was telling about how his insurance won’t be able to cover for his visit to campus health. I suggested to him that maybe he change health care providers to someone who can possibly help cover more things than the one he has now. Also in one of my public health classes one of my teachers is having a luncheon with people who have HIV and I know if I go to the event I can get a better insight on what they are dealing with and find out ways to help them, since the luncheon is ran by an organization that helps people who live with HIV, or I could just give them support

Some of the author’s major points are the lack of understanding of what cultural competence really means which is bringing confusion about ways it can be utilized in the social work field. The confusion of the utilization of cultural competence is leading to the lack of consensus concerning the effective training that providers should obtain and the population being served with the cultural competence skills lack clear description. According to the author, the most popular cultural competence intervention in the healthcare system is the cultural competency training which is for health care providers and the two approaches that have been utilized in creating the intervention are; the programs aimed at improving knowledge which is group specific,

Cultural competences are behaviours, values, attitudes and policies that a body of professionals should encompass in order to effectively work with other cultures (Bureau of Primary Health Care 2005). Culture includes shared values, beliefs, religion, norms and customs. Competence is the ability to function as an individual and part of a team (Office of Minority Health 2017). According to Mayhew cultural competence also involves the impact that culture has on how an individual perceives health, illness and recovery (Mayhew 2016). The Georgetown University emphasized that cultural competence is being able to provide health services that meet social, cultural and language needs of service users. There are different definitions because cultural competency can be viewed from different angles. One angle is from the healthcare professional and what skills they require in order to present cultural competency. The second view is from the service users and one’s culture may affect their perception of health.

The United States has become increasingly a culturally diverse society. The understanding of cultural relativism in a multicultural working environment can be of a great importance to the success or failure of an organization. What is cultural competency? Before we explain it, let’s take a step back and analyze culture, cultural diversity, and Cultural relativism.

From the self-assessment survey for quality and culture I took, I would like to improve and understand how cultural competence can have a real impact on clinical outcomes. There are a few questions I was surprised that I answered them incorrectly. Now I do understand that what I learned in this culturally competence class will help me become more efficient in cultural competence, to provide quality care to all my patients regardless of gender, socioeconomic status, and ethnic, but it will take consistent individual practice, patience, and training on my part to develop and maintain that. I have learned that being culturally competent and implementing sound cultural competency techniques, will help to increase health access and reduce health disparities among different racial and ethnic groups. Cultural competence can lead to, health literacy, health equity, and fewer diagnostic errors, which might help the patient expand their choices and access high quality medical providers because the patient is no longer restricted to a small pool of clinicians who share their culture.

Cultural competence is a set of values, behaviours, beliefs, and policies that come together in a service or amid practitioners, which enables the service or practitioners to work effectively in cross-cultural systems (Sonal-Valias 2009, p. 2). Cultural competence is seen through staff delivering services consistent with the service user’s needs and values. By acknowledging the cultural beliefs, values and customs, the worker can respond to these needs in a culturally competent manner (Sonal-Valias 2009, p. 2). The cultural competence staff training project’s goal is to assist frontline workers to be able to effectively engage and communicate with clients of different cultures, in order to encourage an environment where each staff member, and

Today’s management in the workforce is composed of all types of people verses thirty years ago when white males held a majority of upper-management positions in companies. These positions are now held by a mixture of ethnic back grounds and women who hold just as many if not more management positions then men. Just by looking at the changes in management demographics shows how important it is for people to understand cultural competency in the workplace. Dr. Roosevelt Thomas Jr. (1999) stated, “Diversity is the collective mixture of whomever we have in our workforce characterized by their differences and similarities” (p.11). Managers and supervisors must understand the characteristics of a diversity mature individual; they also need to be

It is high time that people learn about different cultures to have a thorough understanding of the same and thus achieve cultural competency. This is necessary for educators, healthcare givers, attorneys, organizations and all to live in a cross-cultural world without any emotional or physical conflict. Most organizations have their presence in multiple countries and have business relations with people of different cultural groups. So, for a successful business also, cultural competency is the demand.