Cultural competence refers to the ability of a nurse to offer quality healthcare to a patient regardless of patterns of human behaviour that are part of their race and cultural background. Self-knowledge and understanding can be achieved by evaluating one’s own diversity and the comfort level to accommodate the uniqueness of their patients. Nurses who embrace diversity conditionally and try to mask their discomfort while attending to these patients might face more struggle than those who understand their biased nature and seek to improve their understanding (Loftin, Hartin, Branson, & Reyes, 2014). Self-knowledge and understanding other cultures requires the application of detailed knowledge about people. This helps one in appreciating people regardless their background or their cultural affiliation, enabling provision of safe and quality healthcare.
Cultural assessment exercise helps in preventing miscommunication while dealing with patients. The assessment helps in valuing the diversity of patients. This means one is able to accept and respect differences that are found within the many cultures that they may come across while working (Brownlee & Lee, 2018). Some actions such as holding the hand of a patient while talking to them might seem inappropriate to some cultures. The cultural assessment helps to understand that every organization has a culture. The assessment hence allows members to become more aware of the way their organization does things and integrates with patients appropriately.
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I will be more caring to patients while attending them and interact with freely rather than treating them in a way that indicates that I am not comfortable with their culture. I will also seek to know more from them about their culture and to learn about whom they are and what they stand for. This way, I show compassion to the patient while still gaining more knowledge on what different cultures to appreciate who they are.
References
Brownlee, T., & Lee, K. (2018). Building Culturally Competent Organizations. Community Toolbox .
Loftin, C., Hartin, V., Branson, M., & Reyes, H. (2014). Measures of Cultural Competence in Nurses: An Integrative Review. Scientific World Journal .
