Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example

Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example

Multicultural communication refers to the interaction, association, and exchange of information across diverse cultures through politics, sociology, and economics, where the interacting entities preserve their original cultural identity (Olteanu, 2019). Multiculturalism can be traced back to the barter trade era, where different communities interacted and shared their cultures during their economic activities. The trading activities allowed various communities to share their culture and their items, thus promoting their identity. The civil and globalized world has since then promoted multicultural communication in different sectors. In healthcare, multicultural communication leads to improved quality of care and patient safety. Multicultural communication allows health professionals to interact successfully and foster positive relationships with their patients while respecting their beliefs, language, customs, and values.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q2. Compare and Contrast Culture, Ethnicity and Acculturation

Culture, ethnicity, and acculturation are related since they may promote customs, behavior, or values change. For instance, culture and ethnicity are used interchangeably but are completely distinct concepts. Culture refers to a set of beliefs, values, attitudes, customs, behaviors, and practices shared by a group of people or community. Members of a common culture accept, follow, and pass down culture from one generation to another to promote continuity. However, ethnicity relates to shared identity linked to cultural and social heritage, such as language, values, racial traits, and geographical space. Ethnicity aids in identifying a group of people who passed on their cultural distinctness expressed in the mentioned cultural and social heritage. The acculturation process relates to psychological, social, and cultural change resulting from two blending cultures to adapt to the prevailing societal culture (Olteanu, 2019). During the process, an individual or a group adopts the values and practices of a different culture from their own to a lesser or greater extent.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q3. How Cultural and Religious Differences Affect Health Professional

Cultural and religious differences affect the communication and interaction between health professionals and their patients. The differences influence the providers’ decision-making process. Language barriers make it difficult for health professionals to communicate their treatment plans and health recommendations to their patients (Falvo, 2011). Cultural attitude towards disease and health affects the patients’ treatment compliance and cause poor health outcomes. Religious differences also influence providers’ decision-making processes, such as treatment procedures and medications. For instance, patients from religions such as Islam may prefer being treated by specific genders and prefer to keep their hijabs on during care. Thus, healthcare professionals should learn about diverse cultures and religions to ensure they deliver care based on the patient’s preferences and needs.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q4. Family Culture and its Impact on Patient Education

Family culture is transmitted from one generation to another and plays a major contributor to successful patient education. Some cultures claim that discussing disease and death is taboo, thus limiting patient education. Secondly, some cultures emphasize the role of family members in making health decisions, while some prioritize individual independence (Falvo, 2011). In the contemporary health culture, patient education has been linked with improved care quality, patient safety, and health outcomes. Healthcare professionals should recognize and comprehend the familial culture diversities and tailor them to their patient education strategies. Healthcare professionals should integrate patients’ families regardless of where they believe in the collective or individual decision-making process to attain desired outcomes.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q5. Approaches to Address Religious and Cultural Diversity

Healthcare professionals should learn and understand diverse cultures to promote cultural competence during health delivery. Through learning about diverse cultures, health professionals learn to identify anxiety, body language, or silence among diverse patients. Health professionals should also learn diverse languages to ensure they communicate successfully with their patients while avoiding offensive words or phrases (Falvo, 2011). The nurses should also offer translation services and offer culturally sensitive education materials to their patients and families. There is also a need for health professionals to learn, understand, and observe patients’ different religious beliefs, values, and practices that may impede health delivery. (Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q6. Types of Illiteracy

Healthcare professionals should communicate using simple language and vocabulary that patients can understand. However, some patients portray significant learning problems that limit their ability to learn and communicate with their healthcare providers. An excellent example of illiteracy is health illiteracy portrayed by patients is the inability to read or comprehend health care instructions (Liu et al., 2020). Cultural illiteracy relates to a lack of knowledge or understanding of a specific culture, while functional illiteracy limits one’s ability to read or write. Other types of illiteracy entail moral, literal, and civil illiteracy.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q7. Illiteracy as a Disability

Low levels of education and poverty are suitable contributors to illiteracy in society. The problems can be addressed through the elimination of poverty to improve access to education. Illiteracy as a disability limits individuals or patients from accessing crucial information and participating in society. In healthcare, different factors can contribute to patients learning problems as a disability. For instance, a patient with a traumatic brain injury may exhibit a learning disability that may interfere with the patient’s capacity to learn during the injury or even after recovery. Older adults encounter aging health problems such as cognitive and memory decline that manifests as illiteracy during patient education, limiting their ability to listen, comprehend, and follow medical instructions.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q8. Myths about Illiteracy

Myths about literacy perpetuate misunderstanding and stigma. Thus, there is a need for healthcare professionals to educate patients to improve health outcomes. Some individuals believe that illiteracy results from a lack of intelligence or laziness. Other people believe that illiteracy results from low levels of education and socio-economic factors. Although illiteracy may result from low levels of education and socio-economic factors, it can result from disabilities such as brain injuries or even cognitive and memory decline. While healthcare professionals believe that their patients may reveal their illiteracy during interactions, most patients are protective and hide their learning problems to avoid embarrassment and being regarded as illiterate (Flavo, 2011). Thus, health professionals should be strategic in evaluating patients’ literacy levels to inform their communication and interaction with patients.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q9. How to Assess Literacy Skills and Evaluate Material for Readability

Assessing literacy skills and evaluating material for readability are instrumental to mitigating illiteracy in Healthcare. Therefore, healthcare professionals should instruct the patient to restate the provided instructions and perform demonstrations of interventions to assess literacy skills. Patients with the ability to repeat the provided information and demonstrate success are linked with high literacy levels to understand healthcare information. Subsequently, tools such as the Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG) are suitable for evaluating patient literacy and readability levels (Szabó et al., 2021). Patient education materials should be designed based on their level of literacy to promote compliance and treatment outcomes.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q10. Ways to Establish Effective Communication

Effective communication creates a good rapport between health professionals and their patients/families. Effective communication should integrate verbal and non-communication approaches. In verbal communication, healthcare professionals should be audible and use a moderate tone and simple, clear, and concise language to promote successful interaction (Flavo, 2011). Healthcare professionals should avoid medical jargon that may be complicated for the patient to comprehend and should practice active listening skills to identify and understand patients’ concerns. Subsequently, health professionals should maintain eye contact and learn to use their body language to show empathy and concern for the patients during non-verbal communication. There is a need to understand the patient’s body language and silence to make the patient comfortable and build trust.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Q11. Ways Health Professionals Can Help Patients Remember Instructions

Health professionals should assist their patients in remembering instructions to foster treatment compliance. First, health professionals can ensure patients restate provided instructions and demonstrate trained skills to improve their understanding. Secondly, health professionals can write down medical instructions to offer a point of reference for the patients. Using pictures or videos creates a mental image in patients’ minds during patient education, allowing the patient to remember the instructions. Healthcare information should also be simple, accurate, and precise for patients to remember easily (Flavo, 2011). Healthcare professionals should also encourage patients’ families to participate in patient education to assist patients in remembering the information after discharge while encouraging the patients to ask questions, increasing their chances of recalling the health information. (Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

References

Falvo, D. R. (2011). Effective patient education: A guide to increased adherence (4th ed.). Boston, MA: Jones & Bartlett. ISBN: 9780763766252(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Liu, C., Wang, D., Liu, C., Jiang, J., Wang, X., Chen, H., Ju, X., & Zhang, X. (2020). What is the meaning of health literacy? A systematic review and qualitative synthesis. Family medicine and community health, 8(2), e000351. (Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)https://doi.org/10.1136/fmch-2020-000351

Olteanu, A. (2019). Multiculturalism as multimodal communication. Cham: Springer International Publishing.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example)

Szabó, P., Bíró, É., & Kósa, K. (2021). Readability and comprehension of printed patient education materials. Frontiers in Public Health, 9, 725840.(Multicultural Communication and its Origin Comprehensive Nursing Essay Example) https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2021.725840