Paper Example on Cultural Sensitivity

List Five Influences on Your Life That May Inform Your Cultural Sensitivity

I lived in the United States with parents of Asian origin.

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Experienced diverse societal norms and practices of relatives in Asia and the United States. Therefore, I understood and spoke different languages, as I was caught up between two cultures.

Traveling the world with my parents as would their jobs demand, I made many friends from all walks of life. This improved my understanding and tolerance of diverse cultures.

During school volunteer trips to hospitals and nursing homes, I would interact with patients and seniors. Some of whom were friendly and freely shared their cultural beliefs, enriching my knowledge-base on cultural diversity.

Being an avid reader, I enjoyed reading many medical journals by medical specialists of diverse cultures. This broadened my understanding of the need for cultural awareness and sensibility in the healthcare sector.

What Influences in Your Life Inform Your Cultural Sensibility?

Having spent some years in Asia where my parents worked, I am familiar with some of the beliefs and norms of the Asians. Therefore, in my nursing career, I find it it's easier and faster attending to patients of Asian origin. For instance, an elderly male patient came in for routine check-ups and was ailing from chronic arthritis and Hypertension (HTN). Asians especially the elderly, firmly believe that it is shameful to express certain amounts of pain and mental stress symptoms. With this pre-understanding, I immediately shared with him the much I identified with, in his Asian culture. Surprisingly, the tension he had was gone, and he could freely talk of the intensity of pain he suffered in his joints. This earned me his trust. I was able to record the seriousness of his state of health correctly, hence prescribed the right medication (Kruse & Schmitt, 2016).

Cultural differences between patients and health caregivers can adversely affect service delivery regarding access and quality provided. Cultural differences and linguistic variance affect communication and understanding in the healthcare systems (Penn, & Watermeyer, (2018). Clinicians have to identify with a patient's culture directly.

A lack of cultural sensitivity and awareness is detrimental to access to quality healthcare. Medical practitioners may misunderstand patients during diagnosis and prognosis stages. Treatment hitches could be experienced because a patient fails to comply with the recommended treatment plan. This is mainly because of the cultural beliefs of the patient. If the treatment is deemed culturally unacceptable, then medication will be unsuccessful. Unfortunately, misdiagnosis and lack of patient's cooperation could be fatal on the patient's health.

It is essential for medics to always give sufficient time for patients from different ethnic backgrounds from theirs, to explain their thoughts, beliefs regarding treatment prescribed. Stereotyping often occurs when a healthcare giver is not keen to ascertain and find out more about a patient before drawing any conclusions. It is unethical to stereotype patients based on their cultural beliefs as it does not give room for individual exceptions (Tucker, Arthur, Roncoroni, Wall & Sanchez, 2015).

References

Kruse, A., & Schmitt, E. (2016). Social inequality, health and nursing care in old age.

Penn, C., & Watermeyer, J. (2018). Communicating Across Cultures and Languages in the Health Care Setting. Palgrave Macmillan.

Tucker, C. M., Arthur, T. M., Roncoroni, J., Wall, W., & Sanchez, J. (2015). Patient-centered, culturally sensitive health care. American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine, 9(1), 63-77.