Cultural Competence in Nursing

Cultural Competence in Nursing

The five essential constructs of culture according to Campinha-Bacote (2001) are cultural knowledge, cultural awareness, cultural encounters, cultural skill and cultural desires. Acquiring cultural competence is important in nursing because nurses must be able to understand each patients needs; especially those from different cultural backgrounds. The following essay analyzes each of the five essential constructs of culture, and the components and barriers of each.

Cultural Awareness

Cultural awareness is the "self-awareness and critique" (para.4.) of an individuals cultural awareness. This is a lifelong process that a nurse goes through in order to become "respectful, appreciative, and sensitive to the values, beliefs, lifeways, practices and problem-solving strategies of a client's culture" (para.4). This is an important process in nursing; many cultural diverse patients may have different cultural interpretations of their illness, degree of pain and other important factors which must be understood and addressed by the nurse.

Ethnocentrism and Ethnorelativism. Nurses demonstrating ethnocentrism could be a potential danger to their patients. Such nurses feel that their values and beliefs are the only right ones which matter. These nurses can impose their own beliefs on their patients causing the patients cultural needs to be unmet. An ethnocentric nurse will apply the same rehabilitation strategies to all patients, ignoring the patients' cultural background. It is important for these nurses to learn the proper ways of caring for patients of different cultures through individual study and participating in classes on diversity. Learning and experiencing different cultural backgrounds will result in ethnorelativism; the nurse will then appreciate the needs of patients of different cultures. This self-awareness will allow the nurse to adjust his or her practices to the needs of the patient.

Cultural Skill