The Importance of Culturally Competent Care
July is Minority Mental Health Awareness Month, which shines a much-needed light on the discrepancies in our healthcare system.
Many variables account for this, such as stigma around getting help or rigid expressions of gender and identity that can add to the taboo. Many minority and immigrant communities also face a greater likelihood of being uninsured and sometimes are inhibited by language barriers, preventing effective communication, diagnosis, and treatment.
This leads us to the need for culturally competent care. What does that mean exactly?
In layman’s terms, it means understanding patients’ social, religious, linguistic and cultural backgrounds and barriers, then having the policies and staff in place to accommodate them with care and sensitivity.
However, having a general knowledge about patients’ backgrounds and proactively staffing, making institutional policies and collaborating with other agencies to enact the best possible care are two separate things. Many of the issues doctors face in treating minority patients deviate from what’s learned in textbooks and medical school. It requires sensitivity and often personal humility, but is ultimately worth the additional training that goes into it.
Here are some steps to start instituting culturally competent care at your practice:
Hire a diverse staff, including in positions of leadership. Their expertise and personal input will be invaluable to your team.
Holding diversity and sensitivity training leads to improved patient outcomes and attitudes toward mental health treatment.
Increased accessibility in terms of language, disability accommodations, and gender-affirming attitudes drastically reduce barriers to treatment
It’d be helpful if mental healthcare were one-size-fits-all, but we know that’s far from the case. But by understanding and appreciating peoples’ differences, we hold the key to growing trust, decreasing healthcare costs, creating more positive outlooks toward mental healthcare, and improving the whole population’s overall health.
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