Comments on: Can Culturally Competent Healthcare Close Disparities Gaps?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 15:17:51 +0000

May I suggest that in our conversations around diversity, inclusion, equity and engagement in all areas we shift our language from cultural competence to “cultural humility.” Humility is a character trait that most of us white folk would do well to become more proficient at. If you are unsure of what cultural humility would look like, I recommend a start with Melanie Tervalon & Jann Murray-Garcia’s guest editorial in the May, 1998 Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 09:52:53 +0000

Culturally competent healthcare is ultimately patient-centered care. It recognizes that one size does not fit all when it comes to treatment. This is the heart of inclusion, being able to see the individuality of a person, in order to engage them as a customer, employee, or brand ambassador. We are all a minority of one. Forty percent of nurses are born outside the US. Thirty five percent of doctors are born outside the US. So there is great complexity. The inability to see beyond our own cultural lenses has a tremendous impact on treatment and prevention.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 19:21:21 +0000

It is good to finally see someone taking the discussion beyond the rhetoric of the past two decades. Equality of opportunity is more than about preventing discrimination, it’s also about enabling, enpowering and giving vision – through the provision of opportunities, to encourage people to break out of the mindsets that hold them back and the cutural limitations they may conciously or unconsciously constrain them.

The grace with which you responded here is a benchmark of the maturity which is required to move these issues forward in a way that results in true equality of outcomes.
Thank you

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 17:48:55 +0000

As a full-blooded Native Pueblo American from New Mexico; a while doctor is the berst we have; we have maybe 2% Native American medical doctors. The white doctors have treated us efficiently. It is in the mental health realm that I
would like to have Native Pueblo Americans because if if a psychiatrist or psychologist, a non-pueblo will not understand us. Our New Mexico pueblo tribes have a different ceromonial & traditional lifestyle. We are not Pow Wow Indians; though we appreciate that of other tribes.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 16:39:03 +0000

I am preaching cultural competency everyday and the point I try to drive home is cultural is not the color of your skin or the race you identify with. Cultural is language, customs, traditions, values and/or experiences that are unique to a group. Thank You Ms. Macri

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:48:31 +0000

Businesses get a greater margin of return on good customer service if they offer it when their industry becomes more competitive. (Think of it this way: if two people are in a cake-baking contest and they are close in their baking ability, the victory is more likely to go to the one who is also a better cake decorator.) If competition is lacking, there is less of an incentive to offer good customer service. (If one contestant eliminates all the others by getting the judges to change the rules, then that contestant need only bake something passable, and need not decorate his cake at all.)

The problems with healthcare everywhere in the US, and in minority communities in particular, stem from a lack of competition brought about by a healthcare system based around insurance and employment, rather than around a simple exchange of services for money.

Add to this the effect of drug prohibition on Spanish-speaking and black communities and it is easy to see where the problems Macri describes come from, and what effective solutions to them would look like.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:25:45 +0000

I give you kudos for your understanding, your generosity of spirit and your egalitarianism. If we had more people like you, there would be much less violence.