Analysis of Diverse Healthcare

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Hispanic-American
Traditional Views on Medicine
Recommendations on change
Advocacy for change of negative behavior
Conclusion
References

Introduction

Culture of a people affects the provision of quality medical services; some cultures that need to be done away with if quality health care is to be administered in an economy. The United States ministry of health aims at offering quality, timely medical care services to all its citizens, and where applicable it extends the service to neighboring countries. The country has diverse cultural groups whose culture hinders the attainment of the country’s medical service goals and objectives. Hispanic-American has some elements of culture that have hindered the delivery of quality medical care in the United States (Smedley, 2002). This paper discusses the cultural elements of the group that need to be changed so as the United States can have an improved medical care.

Hispanic-American

In 2003, United States polls, Hispanic Americans were the largest minority group living in the country, the people mainly have their origin in Mexico, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean; their origin has a large influence on individual behaviors however there are a number of shared attributed that make a culture among them. Despite the population being a minority in the United States, there is a rapid increase in population of the community calling for medics to consider the health concerns of the Hispanic-American community. The numeric number of the community in 2003 was estimated as 37.4 million, a projection that was made in 2010 suggested that the community is likely to reach 100million in 2040.

The belief that people have influenced how they take issues and consider technological developments in the medical field. When some things are not accepted in a community, then if they are part of the medical care service, the people prophesying the culture are likely to be affected by the culture. Culture influences the decisions and choices that people make when confronted by different issues (Spector, 2005).

Traditional Views on Medicine

Like many traditional communities who are clicked to their culture, Hispanic-American community has high value for traditional medicine and believes they have a solution for every disease that humanity suffers. The belief has been seen as the hindrance of the people from seeking conventional medical system. The community has a medical system called the folk system, which is highly valued by first-generation Hispanics and passed down to generations. The medical system is practiced by traditional doctors called “curanderos” or “santeros”; curanderos is the local term used to mean naturalist healers who only use natural means to cure diseases, the most used natural components are herbs, plants, soil and trees.

santeros on the other hand are believed to have supernatural intervention of saints to heal, aid, and counsel individuals; they are consulted when a person is suffering mostly from psychological disorders like trauma, family disputes and stress.

The medical system adopted by the community is highly valued, the players are not expected to advertise for their services however through informal means, words spread of where they are and the kind of diseases they are healing. Many are the time that some are considered superior and specialists in some areas/diseases. Generally, there is minimal research in the system and the only way the medicines are improved is through consultation after a trial and error method success in one particular part of the community.

The medicine men use a variety of methods to cure their patients some of the methods include massages, herbs, combination of herbs, counseling based on their spiritual capacities called faculties, and cleaning, the methods cannot be regarded as fully ineffective however, there are better ways that the system can be done through conventional method of medical care. For example in the cure of Empacho (a disease of having stomach aches from balls in the stomach), is cured by curanderos by massage and applying some herbs on the patients stomach-it is effective however the reason for the disease may be only be assumed.

Hispanic-Americans believe that health is a gift from God thus when someone is suffering a disease, he is supposed to look into his relationship with God, the belief makes some people who are mostly very religious seek divine intervention when they are sick instead of visiting the medical experts. Some diseases like epilepsy are seen as punishment diseases that are an omen in the community thus a person who is suffering from the disease should not seek medical care; he/she should aim at making peace with the world. Such believes need to be changed and medical care is given the resort of such cases.

The community has a cultural believe of “mal de ojo,” this is a belief that some people have an ill motive and have the power and will to cause malicious diseases on other people. For example, the community believes that if an old man compliment a young child of its beauty, then the child is likely to suffer from a disease, to cure the disease, the community believes that the man who complimented the child should be consulted for his blessings.

What human people belief affects the occurrence of some of the issues so believed, in the case of “mal de ojo,” there has been case of death as the person who complimented the child is sort, sometimes the search has been in vain. Such a belief should be stopped since children and people may get sick and for other reasons other than that. On the other hand there is no scientific prove that the belief works or it is a myth. To avoid negative effects, the community believe that people should be wearing a protective gadget called an onyx in the efforts of keeping the spells away, again there is no scientific prove that the onyx works

In the epidemic of HIV Aids, the community has suffered largely from the disease, they do not believe in the use of condoms and neither do they preach the gospel of abstinence. Men are seen as the superior gender and thus they are allowed to have more than one woman as either a concubine or a second or third wife. The number of wives that mean can get married to be not limited. When such a policy is in the community, then the spread of HIV aids is on the rise hampering the quality of medical care in the country.

The culture as adopted has been passed through generations and it is expected to be the case in the near future if the medical officers in the country fail to act soonest possible. the keepers of the culture are mainly the old people but the young generations are also clicking to the mode of medication (Management Sciences for Health, 2006).

Recommendations on change

One of the most challenging things in the world is to change culture of a people, the way people have been socialized influences how they perceive things and issues. In the case of change of Hispanic-Americans medical treatment system, the United States medical services departments should start by understanding the culture of the people so as they can develop a system to change the behavior. The move should be done by not only the medical experts but also by sociologists and psychologists.

The department should employ the services of a culture intelligence expert. A culturally intelligent person should not jump into conclusion about the beliefs, attributes and behavior that a member in a certain community will have; the fact that certain community culture seems to be looking at a certain direction should not be the only parameter to determine the culture of an individual. To know whether a person is idiocentric or allocentric should not be a decision made in a rush but an intelligent person should suspend his judgment on the decision until he has such relevant information to qualify him take that stand.

Other than studying external environment that affects human behavior and culture, a culturally intelligent people should also focus on individual personality and inborn attributes that affects his behavior. It is only by doing this that proper understanding can be derived (Triandis, 2006).

After getting a good understanding of the medicine, then the medical team should first improve the delivery of the medicine in a way that is hygienically accepted. care should be taken to ensure that the people do not see a rapid change to their medical way of life but they should see as if the government has come to their benefits by improving what they have. The people on the ground should understand that culture exists and prevails in a community because of values that the people practicing the culture hold for it; it is subjective to persons believe thus no one culture can be defined as more superior than another.

When the people are taking the traditional medicines, they are contented that the medicine works and it has worked for them. Different communities have mechanisms to run down culture from one generation to another; when culture is transferred, it undergoes an evolutionary fit to address the need of a certain generation that may be different from needs of the past generation. The action plan for the change and draining of culture elements adopted should follow the following procedure:

Enforce the traditional system

This is where the medical team applaud the traditional medicines and seek to work with the traditional medicines men. At this stage, they should not be seen to be having a hidden agenda since their main motive is to read and understand the forces on the ground. When in these mission, the change agents should seek to understand the problems that the medical care’s givers encounter in the process of offering the medicine, they should pose to offer a solution. During this time, they should be talking about the omens in the system with the medicine men with utmost care. If the medicine men are willing to learn, they can offer the change team a good enters point.

Campaigns and entry strategy

After the change, agents have become used in the community that values and respects visitors, and then they can devise mechanisms to dispense the information that enlightens the community. Care should be taken not to be seen as if the change agents are tackling the culture vice, it should take the approach of enlightening and making sense from the environments and the conditions that the people are going through. It will not hurt to have campaigns and medical camps in the community to enlighten them on different issues.

Opinion leaders within the community should be targeted to offer the information and fight the unaccepted medical practices, they should be trained toughly on conventional medical facts so that they can pass the information to the community.

Advocacy for change of negative behavior

After the people have been enlightened and have appreciated and seen sense, the change agents can go directly to the issue and address it head on. Here they will be pleading with the communities to abandon the cultural elements that are likely to hamper the delivery of quality and timely health services (Dunn, 2010).

Conclusion

Medical facilities need to maintain high level of quality management system so as they can meet their patients medical needs appropriately; in the united states, quality medical care has been hampered by some cultural beliefs. The Folk medical system adopted by Hispanic Americans is one of the cultural believes that has hindered quality medical services delivery. To improve the standard of medical care in the country, cultures that hinder use of conventional medicines should be stopped.

References

Dunn, R. T., (2010). Dunn & Haimann’s Healthcare Management. Illinois: Health Administration Press.

Management Sciences for Health. (2006). The provider’s guide to quality & culture: Hispanics/Latinos and cardiovascular disease. Web.

Smedley et al. (2002). Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care. Washington: National Academies Press.

Spector, R. (2005). Cultural diversity in health & illness. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall Health.

Triandis, H.C.(2006). Cultural Intelligence in Organizations. Group and Organization Management, 31(1), 20-26.

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