There are several barriers to providing culturally competent nursing care, such as language barriers and a lack of understanding. Despite this, cultural competence in nursing is critically important. It builds trust, engages patients, encourages treatment adherence, and reduces health disparities.
Not every patient can access the healthcare services they need, often due to socioeconomic factors. Ethnicity, race, gender, sexual orientation, and a person’s culture can play a significant role in determining whether that person experiences health disparities. It’s one reason why cultural competence in nursing is so important. With greater cultural awareness in nursing, providers can help diverse patients access the care they need.
At Concordia University Texas, our nursing instructors focus on empowering students to deliver high-quality, evidence-based, culturally competent care that patients need and deserve. With our Accelerated Bachelor of Science in Nursing (ABSN) track, a nursing education is within reach, and you might one day care for underserved populations. Before you can provide culturally sensitive care, however, you’ll need to understand what it entails and why it’s important.
What Is Cultural Competence in Nursing?
To understand the importance of cultural considerations in nursing, it’s necessary to understand what cultural competence is. Cultural competence allows nurses to not only accept cultural differences but also incorporate knowledge of differences into their interactions with others.
Someone who is culturally competent understands and accepts that cultural differences enrich life and society. They are able to empathize with and interact well with people who are different from them. This applies to interactions with patients and other providers, and it can affect both workplace culture and patient outcomes.
One example of how cultural competence can affect patients involves health literacy. Individuals from certain socioeconomic backgrounds might have lower levels of health literacy. If a nurse provides wound care instructions, such as “Check for signs of infection daily,” the patient might not know the common signs of infection and might not be willing to ask for clarification. The nurse’s job is to actively check for understanding and clarify as needed.
Learn how to make a career change to nursing in just five steps.
Key Elements of Cultural Competence
There are four key elements of culturally competent nursing care:
Self-Awareness
Before nurses can provide culturally competent care, they must become aware of their own beliefs, values, and implicit biases. Nurses should consider how their own beliefs may affect their perceptions of others.
Attitude
Attitude goes hand-in-hand with self-awareness. Nurses need to understand that their beliefs may cause them to form certain emotional responses to cultural differences. Furthermore, different nurses might develop different attitudes toward the concepts of diversity, inclusion, and equity.
Cultural Knowledge
Once nurses can acknowledge and accept that people come from all walks of life, the next step is to develop an understanding of cultural differences. For example, certain cultural differences could affect problem-solving in the healthcare workplace or a patient’s treatment adherence.
Culturally Competent Skills
The final element of cultural competence in nursing is to put what you’ve learned into action. In a proactive and positive way, you can reduce the risk of letting your implicit biases affect your nursing care.
Overcoming Common Cultural Barriers
There are many barriers to providing culturally competent care. Understanding what these barriers are is essential for working to overcome them.
Lack of Cultural Awareness
A lack of cultural awareness can create a disconnect between patients and nurses, and nurses might not even understand that there is a problem. For example, nurses often ask patients to rate their pain on a scale from 0 to 10. If a patient ranks their pain as a low number, the nurse might assume the patient doesn’t require pain management.
It’s important to note that certain cultures discourage individuals from acknowledging pain or asking for help with their pain. Even if a patient ranks their pain as a “1,” they might actually be in severe discomfort. Nurses must rely on observations of physical indicators of pain as well as verbal discussions.
Language Barriers
Language barriers can be challenging in healthcare. Even if patients speak some English, misinterpretations and misunderstandings can happen. This is one of the easiest barriers to overcome, however, as all U.S. healthcare facilities that accept federal funding, such as Medicare and Medicaid, are required to provide access to medical interpreting services.
Religious Beliefs Regarding Healthcare
Religious beliefs can sometimes pose an obstacle in healthcare. For example, some religious sects discourage members from receiving certain medical procedures, taking medications, or even receiving life-saving blood transfusions.
How to Promote Culturally Competent Nursing Care
It’s every nurse’s responsibility to serve as an advocate for their patients. This involves providing culturally competent care that acknowledges each patient’s background, beliefs, and values. There are many ways of promoting cultural competence in nursing.
The importance of advocacy in nursing should not be overlooked when providing culturally competent care.
Continued Education & Training
A commitment to lifelong education is essential for effective nursing. Stay on top of the latest nursing research and seek opportunities to broaden your cultural knowledge. Some healthcare employers and professional associations offer cultural awareness training opportunities.
Nurses might also consider learning common phrases in foreign languages. Although medical interpreting should only be performed by qualified interpreters, nurses who can say, “Hello, I’m pleased to meet you,” in their patients’ native tongue may be able to establish a stronger rapport.
Diverse Community Engagement and Outreach
Nurses often serve diverse communities. They can take the initiative to ask healthcare administrators to launch engagement and outreach activities. For example, a hospital might invite a local faith leader or community group leader to speak to the nursing staff. This can encourage discussions about the group’s needs and differences.
Embrace a Change in Perspective
When someone is accustomed to primarily interacting with people in their own culture, it’s easy to make assumptions about people from other cultures. For example, a nurse might automatically greet a patient by their first name even if that patient is older than the nurse. In some cultures, this is considered disrespectful. Instead, shift your perspective, challenge your assumptions, and ask your patients for guidance on cultural differences and their personal preferences.
Benefits of Culturally Competent Nursing Care
Nurses who are culturally competent are better able to serve their patients and work with their colleagues. Culturally competent care can lead to the following:
Enhanced Trust
Trust is critically important in nursing care. Patients are more likely to develop a trusting relationship with their providers when they feel a genuine connection with them. Patients need to feel that their whole self is supported, including their beliefs and values.
Trust can be challenging to cultivate, particularly among certain underserved populations. According to a recent study on discrimination and medical mistrust in healthcare, 11% of Hispanic adults and 30% of non-Hispanic black adults who participated in the survey indicated they have felt judged or were treated differently by healthcare providers because of their race or ethnicity.
This can be due to historic injustices. For example, in 1932, 600 Black men in Alabama were enrolled in a syphilis study conducted by the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) called the Tuskegee experiment. The researchers provided only placebos, not treatment, and observed as the men experienced severe health effects like blindness and insanity, as well as death. This led to a strong distrust of healthcare providers.
As a nurse who focuses on providing culturally competent care, you’ll have the opportunity to empower underserved communities and develop patient relationships based on trust and understanding.
Better Patient Engagement and Satisfaction
Patients who work with culturally competent healthcare providers might be more likely to become active participants in their own care. Engaged patients tend to ask questions, absorb information, and adhere to treatment recommendations. They might also experience higher levels of satisfaction with their care.
Reduced Healthcare Disparities
Health disparities stem from many factors, including race, ethnicity, education, income, and sex. Understanding the cultural considerations in nursing is one way to bridge the gap and ensure underserved individuals receive the care they need.
What might this look like in practice? Consider a youth who is suffering from depression and thoughts of suicide yet is afraid to discuss it with a healthcare provider because of the stigma. Bringing cultural competence into nursing care may encourage the youth to confide in their nurses, who can then recommend a mental health screening.
Begin Your Nursing Journey at Concordia Texas
If you are looking for an accelerated BSN track that holistically prepares you for a nursing career, then Concordia University Texas’s ABSN track might be the right fit for you. The ABSN track equips students to provide culturally competent nursing care.
Concordia Texas strives to promote cultural competence and integrate it into nursing education by fostering a diverse and inclusive learning environment. As a Christian university, we believe in empowering students of all backgrounds and encouraging discussions about access, belonging, inclusion, diversity, and equity.
With our ABSN track, you could earn your BSN in as few as 16 months. Plus, you can choose from two ABSN sites in Austin and Dallas. Contact an admissions counselor today to get started.