Cultural Empowerment. Diabetes in Afro-Americans

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Cultural Empowerment
Conclusion
References

Introduction

Diabetes among African Americans is an urgent theme in many medical studies and nursing research. Although certain improvements and opportunities have been discovered for the chosen group of people, control and prevention cannot be ignored. According to King, Moreno, Coleman, and Williams (2018), the number of diabetes-related deaths has considerably decreased due to the expansion of Medicaid for African Americans. However, the health consciousness of communities has to be promoted to reduce diabetes risks (Gross, Story, Harvey, Allsopp, & Whitt-Glover, 2017). Relying on the PEN-3 model, cultural empowerment remains a significant factor in developing culturally sensitive programs for diabetes prevention among African Americans (Ilunga Tshiswaka, Ibe-Lamberts, Mulunda, & Iwelunmor, 2017). In this paper, diabetes risk and positive, existential, and negative beliefs towards healing, God, and food quality will be defined to prove that African Americans are a properly chosen group for this SLP project.

Cultural Empowerment

Cultural empowerment is the ability of people to share their values and traditions within the same cultural group. It is not only the necessity to identify beliefs and interests but an opportunity to contribute to positive health outcomes and well-being. According to the PEN-3 model, cultural empowerment is “a type of collectivism, in that people tend to follow the social norms and expectations of others within their cultural group” (Gross et al., 2017, p. 577). The goal is to define cultural attributes and develop an intervention with the help of which diabetes among African Americans can be controlled.

Positive Beliefs

Positive beliefs introduce the first factor of cultural empowerment, which includes perceptions, nurturers, and enablers to promote health behavior. In the case of African Americans and their intentions to predict diabetes complications, Purcell and Cutchen (2013) defined a belief in God as a source of power and strength. The importance of family cannot be neglected because of the expected impact on future generations and the possibility to share a controlling experience.

Existential Beliefs

The second factor consists of existential beliefs that are characterized by no harmful consequences and poor evidence for being incorporated in the intervention. For example, in their investigation, Purcell and Cutchen (2013) found a person who believed that pain relief was the result of his pastor’s prayer because the pain was gone the next day after communication. Faith healing can be an existential belief because it has a positive emotional effect on a patient, but no credible proof can be found.

Negative Beliefs

Negative beliefs share the attitudes that prevent African Americans from engaging in positive health behaviors. One of the common examples is the choice of food made by African Americans (Ilunga Tshiswaka et al., 2017). Purcell and Cutchen (2013) said that many Blacks could not stop consuming their “comfort” food that is actually full of fat, sugar, and calories, which has a negative impact on their health and contributes to diabetes. Another example is African Americans’ dependence on insurance and the lack of possibilities to detect diabetes at its early stage (King et al., 2018). Finally, cooperation with a healthcare expert may contribute to a better understanding of diabetes, but African Americans do not like to develop contacts unless a serious health problem emerges.

Conclusion

In general, cultural empowerment through positive, existential, and negative beliefs is a good opportunity to understand the cultural anthropology of health and medicine. African Americans introduce a unique cultural group with their traditions, interests, and abilities. Being at risk of diabetes, African Americans do not pay enough attention to the decisions that threaten their health. Therefore, cultural empowerment through God, healing, and food belief has to be promoted in communities.

References

Gross, T. T., Story, C. R., Harvey, I. S., Allsopp, M., & Whitt-Glover, M. (2017). “As a community, we need to be more health vonscious”: Pastors’ perceptions on the health status of the black church and African-American communities. Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities, 5(3), 570–579. Web.

Ilunga Tshiswaka, D., Ibe-Lamberts, K. D., Mulunda, D. M., & Iwelunmor, J. (2017). Perceptions of dietary habits and risk for type 2 diabetes among Congolese immigrants. Journal of Diabetes Research, 2017. Web.

King, C. J., Moreno, J., Coleman, S. V., & Williams, J. F. (2018). Diabetes mortality rates among African Americans: A descriptive analysis pre and post Medicaid expansion. Preventive Medicine Reports, 12, 20-24. Web.

Purcell, N., & Cutchen, L. (2013). Diabetes self-management education for African Americans: Using the PEN-3 model to assess needs. American Journal of Health Education, 44(4), 203-212.

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