Question

What is your interpretation of the connection between cultural competence and the issue of health disparities?

Answer 1

Cultural competence is a dynamic process, where an individual or health care agency develops culturally competent interventions based on the knowledge of cultural beliefs, heritage, behaviours and attitudes to whom they provide care. It is important to identifying the fact that each individual is culturally unique and is a product of experiences in their life, norms of the society in which they live and cultural beliefs.

Although the racial and cultural groups show huge diversity, knowing the baseline data of a particular cultural or racial group provides a meaningful basis to render culturally competent care. Irrespective of the level of care, i.e. primary, secondary or tertiary, a nurse can plan and implement appropriate patient specific intervention in a variety of clinical settings if they have knowledge of culturally relevant information.

Improving cultural competence is an effective way of reducing health disparities through unbiased quality care. Culturally competent care consider the cultural factors and diversity in patient population that directly and indirectly affect health and health care. These include, cultural beliefs, attitudes, communication, language and behaviors. National standards for culturally and linguistically appropriate services in health and health care (National CLAS standards) was established by the Department of Health and Human Services in the United States.