Cultural Perspectives on Health Changing

Cultural Perspectives on Health

Changing behavior

Cultural competence has evolved over several decades and its definition stems from a number of perspectives, needs and interests which are all incorporated into the ideology of cultural competence. However, the work performed by Cross et al. (1989)

posits the best definition to cultural competence and gave a foundation to the idea of cultural competence. According to Cross et al. (1989)

, cultural competence is the combined set of policies, skills, knowledge and attitude which when used together by health care professionals in a health care system or agency enables them to work effectively in situations which are cross-cultural. Cultural competence is important in the healthcare work environment since it assists the health care professionals to be able to deal with patients from all cultures while helping them to recover in the fastest and most efficient way possible.

There are five elements of cultural competence which Cross et al. (1989)

described. These are:

1. Giving value to diversity

2. Capacity building for cultural self-assessment

3. Consciousness on the inherent dynamics during cultural interactions

4. Institutionalizing knowledge on the various cultures

5. Developing adaptations to service delivery which reflect on a deep understanding of the various diverse cultures.

There are many skills which a health care professional needs to demonstrate cultural competence. By understanding and reflecting upon these five elements of cultural competence, this paper will identify, present, describe and analyze of the knowledge, skills and practices needed to work in cross-cultural situations.

Knowledge required for cultural competence

To become a culturally competent practitioner, there is some level of knowledge that is required Lum, 2010.

First, the health practitioner should have the required knowledge to be able to assess different patient's situations, diagnose, treat, and manage their diseases or conditions. Without this knowledge, the health care practitioner will not be competent in their practice.

Secondly, the health care practitioner should be well knowledgeable regarding the various medications that are available in the market, which ones are banned, in what countries they are banned, which have adverse reactions to certain things that are culturally related such as herbs and other cultural foods and other relevant information.

The health care practitioner should be well knowledgeable in the management of aggression especially when handling a large community and not just an individual patient. When a certain aspect of medicine contradicts with a particular cultural belief or value, the members of the community tend to become overly aggressive and opposed to this particular behavior. The health care practitioner should be well aware of such cultural issues in order to avoid this kind of aggression and opposition or if necessary, to manage the aggression while providing the best care for the community and the patients.

Certain cultures or groups of people may be involved in practices that cause self-harming behaviors. By understanding these cultural differences, the health care practitioner can be able to deal with the situation with the utmost privacy, responsibility, and safety in order to avoid the recurrence of this behavior or to manage it at a lesser level of occurrence.

A culturally competent health care practitioner should have a deep understanding of the patterns of culture and history which have shaped the lives of the various cultural people in the past and to be able to relate these cultures to how they are affecting their lives in the current world. By understanding this, the practitioner will be able to give the best care that does not interfere with the culture of the individual rather compliments it.

The culture of an individual is also a huge contributing factor in understanding their behavior. Humans behave differently and if we look at the health belief model, the four aspects of the model which are the perceived benefits, perceived barriers, perceived severity and perceived susceptibility are all influenced by the cultural beliefs and values of an individual and the community at large. A person's health seeking behavior is also influenced by their cultural beliefs. By understanding these cultural aspects, the health care practitioner can be able to find the best possible way to convince individuals towards seeking health are at health care institutions and to give the best care that does not contradict or demean their cultures.

Values

A culturally competent health care practitioner needs to be aware of the personal beliefs and values of the individuals and the community as a whole. They can therefore devise programs which provide the individuals with the option of abandoning the cultural values that are contradicting to modern health care and in order for them to get the best health care option. This can serve as a benchmark for judging and measuring people's behavior of people as relates to their different cultural backgrounds.

Translating evidence into practice

Translating evidence into practice is another importance value that every culturally competent health care practitioner needs to have. It has become a widely discussed topic in conferences, talks and other forums. The emphasis on evidence-based practice has been brought about by the need to improve health care in various health care institutions all over the world as well as the need to provide holistic care. Also, there has a wide gap between the publishing of research results and the application of these results in practice. This emphasis of translating evidence to practice is aimed at bridging that gap and to help find new focus and priorities for research to fill any gaps of knowledge that may exist. Translating evidence into practice also helps health care individuals to be culturally competent. Much research has been conducted on various test subjects who stem from different cultural backgrounds and by understanding what this research tells us, we will be able to be culturally competent in the practice.

Translating evidence into practice is a commonly used phrase especially in the medical world. It refers to the situation where evidence from various sources such as clinical trials, medical research and other scientific studies is used to develop a basis on which the clinician or nurse makes their decision about the particular disease, condition or aspect concerned.

There are several reasons why there is a need to apply translation of evidence into practice. Translating evidence into practice improves the individual and organizational experience of change and improves their responsiveness and response to the environment and their perceived benefits also change White et al., 2011.

Evidence-based practice helps to ensure patients receive the right care for their case Burns and Grove, 2009()

Evidence-based practice also helps to identify gaps in knowledge that may exist. By questioning the current practice, the health care professionals are able to guide researchers on what should be the focus and priority in their research so as to fill these gaps Mateo and Kirchhoff, 2009()

Evidence-based research will also help to ensure an interdisciplinary approach to the provision of health care to patients by organizing myself to engage other health care professionals in fields such as psychology and physiotherapy. By involving these other disciplines in the clinical care of patients, it helps to recognize other fields and appreciate their specialization and eventually provide the patient with the best health care. It will also create a culture of collaboration among health care professionals and help them adapt with ease to their various roles in the collaboration Lee et al., 2011()

Translating evidence to practice or evidence-based practice helps to empower patients to take care of their own health care. In this way, my practice will be impacted by patients who are willing to gain insight into the health care provided to them, the procedures or tests being run, any risks or side effects they are exposed to and to ensure that general care is taken such as washing hands before doing procedures on patients or using protective equipment such as gloves.

Evidence-based practice will help to decrease morbidity and mortality in my practice since the patients will be handled with extreme care and caution to provide the best possible care.

All in all, evidence-based practice will help to improve the clinician's quality to the patient despite the cultural background of the patient and to provide appropriate care to the patient without any delay or complications since the method chosen will be culturally acceptable.

Skills

To be a culturally competent health practitioner, there is a mix of skills that they need to carry out their duties. These skills need to complement their knowledge and values to enable them to work efficiently and effectively in the cultural context. Some of the skill needed include decision-making to make appropriate decisions for the particular situation. They also need to be able to analyze information provided correctly to be able to make the right decision. Third is to determine priorities and to know what should come first and what else to follow.

A culturally competent health practitioner also needs to work as a team member. Since certain decisions and procedures require several health practitioners to effectively and efficiently work together as a team and to collaborate in the best way to provide the most appropriate health care for the individual regardless of their cultural background.

In the health care practice, there are those aspects of culture that are sensitive and that the health care practitioners need to consider when making decisions related to the practice. Some of these cultural aspects are those that contradict with the principles of modern medicine. Therefore, by the practitioner having a good understanding of these sensitive aspects of culture, he/she will be able to make the appropriate decision for the situation at hand.

Communication skills are also important for all culturally competent health care professionals. For example, in situations which concern culture and the norms associated with culture based on the amount of information that can be disclosed and the type of information. This can form a serious barrier in the provision of health care and therefore the practitioner needs to understand the culture and the norms in order to be able to enable communication and self-disclosure of the patient.