Cultural Competency in Health Promotion Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Cultural Competency in Health Promotion - Essay Example In this way, communication during health care is limited because the patient has no obligation to communicate his/her feelings. Lack of health education in our culture has led to poor medical care hence the inadequacy in the knowledge about the health services being offered. Some cultural groups have a poor decision leader who must be available for a decision to be arrived at. To overcome the above problems, there must be a development of culturally competent practices that involve self analysis and change of attitude in various cultures. Health care providers should expand their knowledge and not only focus on culture differences while striving to understand the cultural dynamics affecting medical practice and healthcare in general. They should learn about cultures they sever through, they ought to know patients assessment techniques, readings and community activities. Medical practitioners should improve on the cross-cultural communication by being aware of the difference in social norms and knowledge of different languages and lifestyles. The use of assessing health literacy, interpreters and the bilingual patient education materials in educating the community on health matters (Spector, 2009) can play an important role especially from the training period of the medics. Involvement of the community in health matters through health fairs, ethnic festival participation and constant communication with cultural decision makers. These leaders help in providing cultural competent care by strengthening communication ties. It is important for nursing practitioners to work towards cultural competency through provision of culturally competent patient care. Nurses should therefore, be sensitive and open-minded to avoid being compromised by the cultural differences in perception of illness. While communication skills should be used in the best interest of the patient, limits must be set to ensure that the patient does not manipulate the treatment required. Nurses can de velop cultural competency by understanding individual and organizational views of different cultures. Acquisition of background knowledge about a patient on the cultural views can help in decision making. Having collective communication skills will then enable one to get the real meaning of words even if the patient is from a different culture. There should be strong ties between the nurse and the community. However, nurses must be aware of national and professional priorities for caring of cross culturally populations. Responses from 3 families from different cultures The three families interviewed were from middle-class status of life. The families interviewed were an African family, a Latino family, and a white American family. The interviews were contacted at the community hospital. It was to understand their take on cultural differences in medication and modern treatment. Health maintenance The African family did not have better ways to maintain their health compared to other f amilies. They only look for health services when they are sick. It was the responsibility of the family to take the sick person to the hospital when other alternatives have failed. Latinos families have an average medical attention towards maintaining their health. They rely very much on health centers for the services. The white American fa