Cultural competence

Home > Communication > Health Communication > Cultural competence

Understanding and respecting cultural differences to effectively communicate health information to diverse populations.

Cultural Diversity and Inclusion: Understanding the different ways in which cultures operate and how to create a respectful and inclusive environment for all individuals.
Cultural Competence in Healthcare: The ability to provide culturally relevant and sensitive healthcare services to patients from diverse cultural backgrounds.
Linguistic Competence: The ability to communicate effectively with individuals who speak different languages.
Demographic Changes and Health Disparities: The impact of demographic changes on disparities in health care and how to address these disparities.
Health Beliefs and Practices: Understanding cultural beliefs and practices related to health and how they affect patient care.
Patient-Provider Communication: Understanding the importance of clear and effective communication in healthcare and how to improve communication between patients and providers.
Cultural Competence and Ethics: Understanding the ethical implications of cultural competence in healthcare.
Health Literacy: Understanding the ways in which health literacy affects healthcare outcomes and how to provide healthcare services to individuals with low health literacy.
Cultural Competence in Research: Understanding the importance of cultural competence in research and how to conduct culturally sensitive research.
Legal and Regulatory Issues in Cultural Competence: Understanding the legal and regulatory issues related to providing culturally competent healthcare services.
Trauma-Informed Care: Understanding how traumatic experiences can affect health and how to provide trauma-informed care.
Intersectionality: Understanding how a person's multiple identities relate to their cultural beliefs and practices.
Bias and Stereotyping: Understanding the impact of bias and stereotyping on healthcare and how to reduce their effects.
Health Disparities and Social Determinants of Health: Understanding the relationship between social determinants of health and health disparities.
Cultural Competence and Health Policies: Understanding the role of cultural competence in healthcare policies and how to advocate for policies that promote cultural competence.
Linguistic competence: This type of cultural competence involves the ability to communicate effectively with individuals who may speak different languages.
Attitudinal competence: Involves understanding and respecting different cultural norms and acknowledging cultural diversity.
Cultural sensitivity: Is being aware of and respecting the unique characteristics of different cultures and their values, beliefs and traditions.
Ethical competence: Health care professionals recognize the impact of their beliefs and values on health care delivery, and adopt ethical principles to guide their practice.
Cognitive competence: It is the ability to learn about and understand the cultural factors that affect health behavior, beliefs, and attitudes.
Emotional competence: The capacity to recognize and manage emotions of yourself and others and use those emotions to inform thinking and actions.
Behavioral competence: The ability to adapt behavior and communication styles to interact effectively with people of different cultures.
Organizational competence: Health care organizations develop policies and practices to support cultural competence in its employees and delivery of care.
Structural competence: Incorporates the economic and political context in which health care is delivered and shaped by social determinants of health.
- "Cultural competence, also known as intercultural competence, is a range of cognitive, affective, behavioural, and linguistic skills that lead to effective and appropriate communication with people of other cultures."
- "Intercultural or cross-cultural education are terms used for the training to achieve cultural competence."
- "Effective intercultural communication relates to behaviors that culminate with the accomplishment of the desired goals of the interaction and all parties involved in the situation."
- "Appropriate intercultural communication includes behaviors that suit the expectations of a specific culture, the characteristics of the situation, and the level of the relationship between the parties involved in the situation."