Culture Competence

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.

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).

I enjoyed reading your thoughtful discussion post on cultural competency of organizations and nurses. Your rationale for both the organization and the individual nurse being responsible to ensure culturally competent care was similar to mine. For example, I mentioned the need for nursing curriculums at all levels of nursing education to provide competency training (American Academy of Colleges of Nursing website, 2011).

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.

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,

In this great nation we live in today that has been vastly increasing diversity bring so many great opportunities. But with these great opportunities there are also challenges that are continually looked over constantly. One of the challenges is our health care system that fails to deliver culturally competent services. Cultural competency helps to enable providers to deliver services that are respectful to diverse patients. This helps with patients own health beliefs, practices and cultural and linguistic needs. This is why this training is needed in every health facility. Many doctors go through this problem not understanding their patient’s needs. If I were a doctor I would use this skill. Certain racial and ethnic minorities receive poorer

Arthur H. Woodard, Jr., MSW Soulhelp@me.com Jim Wuelfing, NRPP Jim.Wuelfing@gmail.com  Name?  From where?  Doing what?  Why here?

“Cultural competence is the ability to engage in actions or create conditions that maximize the optimal development of client and client systems” (Sue & Sue, 2013, p. 49). Multicultural competence includes a counselor to be aware of his or her biases, knowledge of the culture they are evaluating, and skills to evaluate a client with various backgrounds (Sue & Sue, 2013). Client assessment involves gathering information pertaining to the client’s condition. Making a culturally responsive diagnosis involves using the DSM-IV-TR axis (Hays, 2008). Following the axis backwards is ideal to discovering the client’s diagnosis, understanding the client’s ADDRESSING outline will help to come to a closer resolution

Campinha- Bacote and colleagues describes the components for cultural competence in healthcare. These includes cultural ; a) knowledge, b) awareness, c) skills, d) encounter and e) desire. Cultural awareness refers to self-examination as well as in-depth exploration of an individual cultural as well as professional background. I am able to explore my own cultural healthcare values and beliefs. This is because understanding another person's does not guarantee that one will become cultural competent. I am now able to use the cultural awareness assessment to assess my personal level of cultural awareness, and to get an insight on the understanding of my cultural values and beliefs

Another outstanding point that you made in reference to applying cultural competence in your personal life is phenomenal. I believe getting to know who we are will help us pinpoint the areas that are not the strongest when providing cultural care to patients. Allowing us to work on our weaknesses and become proficient in the areas we lack. In order for us to become an expert in cultural competency and cultural care we need to apply it in every aspect of our lives.

Providing culturally competence are available constructs in augmentation of patient centered healthcare delivery that has been heavily emphasized in recent years. In particular to this writer’s professional career there have been ongoing improvements seen on a corporate and care level made to the implementation in providing culturally competent care. In this paper, we explore culturally competent and patient centered care with the Mexican female population here in the northeast. In doing so, the demonstration of timely theoretical frameworks of cultural competence must be afforded to our patients; to improve interactions in an interpersonal level. This group was recognized primarily due to identifying the integral role the female plays

"A set of congruent behaviors, attitudes and policies that come together as a system, agency or among professionals and enable that system, agency or those professionals to work effectively in cross-cultural situations. The word "culture" is used because it implies the integrated pattern of human thoughts, communications, actions, customs, beliefs, values and institutions of a racial, ethnic, religious or social group. The word competence is used because it implies having a capacity to function effectively."

I believe I can improve my cultural competence by learning to understand the opinions of family members about the intervention process with older and elderly individuals. I enjoy helping and serving people, so it is hard for me to understand that some patients and families do not want to seek help. I need to learn to set my own opinions aside and be competent toward the wants and needs of the family.

Understand cultural competence and why is it important especially for that have a diverse workforce.

Cultural competency is an indispensable in nursing practice so that nurses can deliver optimal care for patients from diverse cultural backgrounds. Therefore, insufficient knowledge and skills of cultural competency has continued to increase racial and ethnic inequalities in healthcare service for minority groups (Dunagan et al. 2013; Long, 2012). As nurses interact with clients they provide nursing care, education and advocacy at any point in need. Cultural awareness remains the basis for nurses to develop of interest to continue and advance in knowledge and skills to deliver cultural competent care (Calvillo, 2009). To complete the critical analysis of the integrative