Remember 3 things when serving different cultures
Providers and experts on culture diversity share three tips on what you should remember when serving culturally diverse clients:
• Find out who the authority figures are in the family.
"One mistake people make when they’re on private duty is to not recognize that there is often an elder person there who has a great deal of authority in that situation," says Sondra Thiederman, a trainer in cross-cultural health care in San Diego.
"We kind of tend to ignore those people and to not cultivate them the way we should like calling them by their last name, saying hello to them when we arrive and goodbye to them when we leave. All those kinds of subtle social things reflect the hierarchical structure of lots of ethnic families."
For example, in Asian cultures, you need to feed the elderly people first, adds Lea Armstrong, president/project director of Armstrong Uniserve, with offices in Tacoma, Kent, and Seattle, WA. "As they get older, they feel like they have earned the respect, and they want special consideration."
• Act more formally in the homes of culturally diverse clients.
Sometimes aides get a little too familiar with people when in their homes, says Thiederman, such as calling clients by their first names. In some cultures, this is a sign of disrespect. "With lots of immigrant groups, you have to warm up more slowly," she says.
• Remember that their reactions may be appropriate for their culture.
How different cultures respond to and express pain is a good example of this, says Thiederman. Asians in general have a strong desire to maintain harmony in relationships. "That means not wanting to call attention to an individual. By calling out in pain, it’s like disrupting the harmony of the situation, so they won’t do it."
"In the reverse," she continues, "sometimes you can have people from other cultures who are voicing every concern, and you become impatient because you think they’re becoming hysterical when it’s just the way they’ve been conditioned to behave."
The grief process is another example of differences in cultures. In Morocco, one of the Muslim sects believes that when someone dies, those left behind go into a three-day mourning period. "This is three days where you might as well not mess with them because they are going to roll up into a little ball and not be there," says Paula Elberhoumi, RN, BSN, MS, owner of The Creative Pen, a business in New York City that contracts with home health care agencies to provide educational services.
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