Equality, Diversity and Human Rights in Healthcare

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Social diversity is a characteristic that can be used to enhance human survival but also if the wrong approach is applied it could be detrimental. The health department can be in a position to provide better services to the public are the issue of diversity is addressed. Diversity means respecting and valuing the difference in people. These differences can be in cultural beliefs, religion, and ethical among others. The health care system is responsible for devising mechanism through which patients can receive medical care without their rights being infringed. Equality and human rights for instance are very important aspects in social diversity. This paper will be discussing the issues of social concerns in relation to the health profession especially equality, diversity and human rights issues.

Equality mean treating human beings as equals without discriminating based on any personal characteristics. There are different characteristics that are protected as provided for in the Equality act [2010] (Duke, 2011). They include age, disability, sex, sexual orientation, race, religion, gender reassignment, marriage and partnership, as well as pregnancy and maternity (Martino, and Pallotta-Chiarolli, 2003). Equality is a duty to all public providers and the department of health must be in the forefront to defend the rights of patients as well as its employees. A productive health care system must be able to provide its services in an equitable manner as required by law. Recognizing this fact, the health practitioners therefore must acknowledge and appreciate the diversity of a population in order to provide equitable services.

Equity can be achieved in a health system that acknowledges the diversity of the population respecting the expectations and needs of the patients, the staff and the services as a whole (Emmett, and Alant, 2006). In the recent past, the department of health has been keen on the issues of equality in the department of health (Emmett, and Alant, 2006). The department has been keen to seal all the loopholes that provide access to unequal access and outcomes experiences to some sections of the community. The department has been working to ensure the principles and practicalities of fairness and equality are achieved (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2007). To achieve this, human rights must play a very crucial and fundamental role should be integrated in the department of health.

Multiculturalism is the promotion of ethnic diversity and multiple ethnic cultures (Emmett, and Alant, 2006). In the health, depart of health; this is a very crucial aspect to consider when dealing with patients as well as he staff. For the purposes of effectiveness, the health department must seek to integrate ethnic diversity and promote ethnic cultures by acknowledging their existence and respecting personal beliefs. The respect for interculturality is vital in the health department since there are different cultures with different beliefs and practices that if not well managed may hinder health services delivery. The health department is obligated by law to have policies that address the issue of disability, and impairment (Emmett, and Alant, 2006).

According to the British social model, the society is responsible for disabling the physically impaired people (Emmett, and Alant, 2006). Disability can be eliminated from the minds of people by simply changing the society. Appreciating our social diversity means being polite to other people and respecting their rights. Discrimination in the health department is an unfortunate event that can be detrimental to its effectiveness. Judging or discriminating people based on their appearance are also very retrogressive. All patients must be accorded equal medical attention regardless of their physical appearance.

In the society, people are divided in different social goups depending on the culture of the population. These groups include elitism, gender, language, ethnicity, sexuality among other classifications. Several areas permit additional research. Most studies of health provision patterns are limited to physicians (Emmett, and Alant, 2006). Prospective studies should examine the impact of concordance between patients and other health professionals, predominantly nurses, who interrelate directly with patients (Bauer, 2001).

Studies have not sufficiently scrutinized the relative contributions of language concordance vs. combined language and ethnic concordance (Bauer, 2001). Thus, issue has momentous inferences for which guiding principle solutions are more likely to enhance quality of care for patients with limited English aptitude. Researchers must therefore compare the quality of care in meetings and relationships in at three smallest categories: concordant language/ethnicity, concordant language/discordant ethnicity, and discordant language/ethnicity (Bauer, 2001).

There is a dire need in the United States to achieve a medical system that reflects the diversity of the American people. The Association of American Medical Colleges ‘AAMC’ shares the same opinion also (Bauer, 2001). The underrepresented marginalize races in the American health workforce include African- Americans, Mexicans, native Americans as wells as Puerto Ricans (Bauer, 2001). The underrepresented marginalize races are the races that account for the lowest number of professionals in the heath sector. The black Americans are not very well represented in the American health care system fraternity. Very few doctors and nurses are from the African-American descent. Most of the Americans from of the Latin descent are significantly unrepresented in the medical fraternity although the population of these minority keeps on growing every year. Compared to their population in the US, the numbers of representation in the health sector is dismal and almost negligible.

The federal government has been supporting some programs that are meant to improve and enhance the health care workforce diversity (Duke, 2011). Such initiatives include Health Careers Opportunity Program ‘HCOP’, Centers of Excellence ‘COE’, and Minority Faculty Fellowship Programs ‘MFFP’ (Duke, 2011). These programs are focussed on enhancing the diversity across a wide range of the health care field (Bauer, 2001).The challenge is primarily presented by the fact that the diversification of the health profession des not necessary means an improvement in the health outcomes. Raising the number of racial and ethnic marginalised health professionals would present superior chances for marginalised patients to see a consultant from their own racial or ethnic background or for patients with inadequate English adeptness, to see a specialist who speaks their mother tongue. Racial, ethnic, and language concordance may develop the excellence of communication, ease level, or trust in patient-practitioner interaction and thus improving corporation and judgment. This may in turn boost loyalty to helpful programs or schedules, eventually resulting in enhanced health results.

Superior diversity in the health care staff might boost trust in the health care delivery structure (Bauer, 2001). Racial and ethnic marginalised patients primarily may have doubts about the health systems and organizations that are administered and staffed by mainly White health experts, due to chronological isolation and prejudice. If this were the case, mounting diversity might amplify minority populations’ trust, and in turn, their propensity to use services at those systems and organizations (Bauer, 2001). Patients want to have a sense of belonging and to have a point of relation to their health service providers. When the health practitioner is a fellow clan’s man, the patients feel free to share their medical conditions since they feel like they are talking to one of their own. Diversification in the health profession is paramount for so many other reasons. A number of cultural difference, there are many aspects of cultural disparities that can critically hinder medical professionals from offering their services.

Different cultures may express their pain or agony n different ways. If a health practitioner is forced to take care of a patient whose cultural beliefs are different, communication barrier might come into play in such a situation. For example, certain communities it is a taboo to ask a grown up to do anything if you are young. With most of the heath professionals being quite young men and women, some patients may find it offensive when they are asked to lower their pants for an injection or any other medical test. Other advantages of diversity in the health profession includes avoid language barriers. Some of the patients visiting a health facility do not speak English. With a diversified workforce of nurses and doctors, the problems present by this dilemma are averted. This therefore enhances communication and consequently improves the level of quality service delivery in the health department.

Broader diversity among health professionals may widen the precedence of the health care delivery system (Bauer, 2001). Specifically, health professionals from racial and ethnic minority and socioeconomically underprivileged environments may be supplementary (Bauer, 2001). This is because they are more likely to support the implement policies and programs to advance health care for deprived populations than others are (Bauer, 2001). These programs and policies might get bigger admittance to health services or advance excellence in the delivery of health services (Röndahl, Innala, and Carlsson, 2007). They may also produce better stress and resources dedicated to research, promotion, or service in areas applicable to alternative and other deprived populations. Improved admittance, quality, and interest to issues appropriate to marginalised and other underprivileged populations would be expected to get better health results for those populations (Jones, Pynor, Sullivan, and Weerakoon, 2007).

Diversity without a doubt is crucial to the profession’s concentration on the health services. As discussed in this paper, human diversity is something to celebrate rather than to complain about. Our differences should be our pride as human beings and not hindrances for better and mutual interactions. The paper argues that diversity in health practice is a major challenge but also great opportunity to harness the young talents in every social setting. Humans being social beings are bound to creating social boundaries that can be hindrances to health services or can be used to enhance the same services depending on the approach used to address the issue of diversity. The paper gives valid advantages of greater diversity in the health practice citing like communication enhancement. Discussed in the paper, diversity can enhance trust among patients. The marginalised communities lack trust in the health systems because they feel like strangers when they visit such facilities. Having some employees from their cultural setting can improve their confidence in the system.

Sexuality is a complex aspect of life whereby people are not fully aware of their sexual preference (Kinsey, Pomeroy and Martin, 1948). Both boys and girls are in a personality crisis trying to figure out what sexuality is all about especially during adolescent. Diverse sex gender is a subject of great concern surrounded by aspects of human indecency (Kinsey, Pomeroy and Martin, 1948). People are not very comfortable discussing the legitimacy of the LGBTQ spectrum openly all because of the moral-fabric issue. Boys and girls are the most affected by the sexuality issue when they are just about to get to adult hood and without proper sex and gender diversity in the health system; they are prone to prejudice (Kinsey, Pomeroy and Martin, 1948).

The story of Aimee Mullins is moving and very encouraging considering her condition during birth. Her condition proves there are many handicapped people out there who do not allow their physical challenges to limit their ability to function as normal human beings (Röndahl, Innala, and Carlsson, 2007). She argues that the only disability is when a person’s spirit is crushed and this is very viable. She puts up a very relevant argument about the power in our world’s choice (Röndahl, Innala, and Carlsson, 2007). Aimee as an amputee has defied the odds and she has gone ahead to describe herself as differently able person rather than disabled which is an encouraging approach to life.

Young people get themselves into habits that are detrimental to their health like alcohol. Such practices that are seen as an initiation to adulthood more often than not influence most of the teenagers. Teenagers at this stage are willing to do anything just feel that they are men hence anything that the older generation consider male oriented, boys will innocently engage in it to fit in the trend (Duke, 2011). Teenagers are the most affected when it comes to personality crisis. Hence, boys stuff is a major contributor to gender diversity since it is through such initiation stages that some young boys lose their personality in pursuit of the ideal behavior of men (Duke, 2011).

References

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare 2007, ‘Intellectual disability in Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’, Journal of Intellectual & Developmental Disability, vol. 32, no. 3, pp. 222–225.

Bauer, A. M. 2001, ’’Tell them we‘re girls’: The invisibility of girls with disabilities’ Educating young adolescent girls, Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, pp. 29-45.

Duke, T.S. 2011, ‘Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Youth with Disabilities: A Meta-Synthesis’, Journal of LGBT Youth, vol. 8, pp. 1-53.

Emmett, T. and Alant, E. 2006, ‘Women and Disability: exploring the interface of multiple disadvantage’, Development Southern Africa, vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 445-460.

Jones, M.K., Pynor, R.A., Sullivan, G. and Weerakoon, P. 2007, ‘A Study of Attitudes Toward Sexuality Issues Among Health Care Students in Australia’, Journal of Homosexuality, vol. 52, nos. 3/4, pp. 73-86.

Kinsey, A.C., Pomeroy, W.B. and Martin, C.E. 1948, Sexual behaviour in the human male, W.B. Saunders, Philadelphia.

Martino, W. and Pallotta-Chiarolli, M. 2003, You’re not a real boy if you’re disabled boys negotiating physical disability and masculinity in schools, in: So what’s a boy? : addressing issues of masculinity and schooling, Open University Press, Maidenhead, England.

Röndahl, G., Innala, S. and Carlsson, M. 2007, ‘To Hide or Not to Hide, That Is the Question! Lesbians and Gay Men Describe Experiences from Nursing Work Environment’, Journal of Homosexuality, vol. 52, nos. 3/4, pp. 211-233.

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Equality, Diversity and Human Rights in Healthcare

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