Lights Slow, and controls the progress
CULTURALCOMPETENCE ■ 351
CULTURALCARE is the term I have coined to express all that is inherent in this text. Countless conflicts in the health care delivery arenas are predi- cated on cultural misunderstandings. Although many of these misunder- standings are related to universal situations, such as verbal and nonverbal language misunderstandings, the conventions of courtesy, sequencing of in- teractions, phasing of interactions, objectivity, and so forth, many cultural misunderstandings are unique to the delivery of health care. The necessity to provide CULTURALCARE—professional health care that is culturally sensitive, culturally appropriate, and culturally competent—is essential as we live in this millennium, and it demands that providers be able to assess and interpret a given patient’s health/HEALTH beliefs and practices. CULTURALCARE alters the perspective of health care delivery as it enables the provider to under- stand, from a cultural perspective, the manifestations of the patient’s HEALTH care beliefs and practices. Note, that the terms CULTURAL COMPETENCY and CULTURALCARE are written in small capitals to indicate that the view is holistic— three dimensional rather than two.