The term “cultural competency” has been batted around quite a bit in the health care
arena in recent years, but what does it mean and how are cultural groups defined?
Unfortunately, the explanation one receives ultimately depends on whom is being asked,
as there is currently no agreed-upon definition of what it means to be culturally
competent and deliver culturally competent care in any of the medical professions,
including dietetics, where diet recommendations must acknowledge cultural needs without
making assumptions and where the literature on this subject is not particularly robust
(
1
).To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
Purchase one-time access:
Academic & Personal: 24 hour online accessCorporate R&D Professionals: 24 hour online accessOne-time access price info
- For academic or personal research use, select 'Academic and Personal'
- For corporate R&D use, select 'Corporate R&D Professionals'
Subscribe:
Subscribe to Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and DieteticsAlready a print subscriber? Claim online access
Already an online subscriber? Sign in
Register: Create an account
Institutional Access: Sign in to ScienceDirect
References
- Cultural competency: Where it is and where it's headed.J Am Diet Assoc. 2009; 109: 388-394
- Cultural competence and medical education: Many names, many perspectives, one goal.Acad Med. 2006; 81: 499-501
- Hospitals, Language, and Culture: A Snapshot of the Nation: Exploring Cultural and Linguistic Services in the Nation's Hospitals: A Report of Findings.(Accessed April 11, 2009)
- Commentary: Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.Acad Med. 2009; 84: 157-158
- Scores stable as more minorities take SAT.(Washington Post. August 27, 2008) (Accessed March 8, 2009)
- Viewpoint: Physician, know thyself: The professional culture of medicine as a framework for teaching cultural competence.Acad Med. 2008; 83: 106-111
- Losing culture on the way to competence: The use and misuse of culture in medical education.Acad Med. 2006; 81: 542-547
- Integrating cultural competency into the undergraduate medical curriculum.Med Educ. 2006; 40: 704-710
- Cultural competency of graduating US Bachelor of Science nursing students.Contemp Nurs. 2008; 28: 37-44
- Engaging pharmacy students with diverse patient populations to improve cultural competence.Am J Pharm Educ. 2008; 72: 124
- How to catch the story but not fall down: Reading our way to more culturally appropriate care.Med Educ. 2006; 8: 315-318
- Model for multicultural nutrition counseling competencies.J Am Diet Assoc. 2000; 100: 1178-1185
- Self-reflection in multicultural training: Be careful what you ask for.Acad Med. 2005; 80: 694-701
- “That never would have occurred to me”: A qualitative study of medical students' views of a cultural competence curriculum.BMC Med Educ. 2006; 6: 31-38
- The myth of value neutrality.Med Educ. 2006; 8: 341-344
- Ethical and scientific implications of the globalization of clinical research.N Engl J Med. 2009; 360: 816-823
- Stigmatized patients' right to equal treatment.Med Educ. 2006; 8: 298-302
- N.J. mandates cultural competency training.(June 1, 2005) (Accessed May 5, 2009)
- Is evidence-based medicine patient-centered and is patient-centered care evidence-based?.Health Serv Res. 2006; 41: 1-8
Article info
Footnotes
This article was written by Karen Stein, MFA, a freelance writer in Querétaro, México. Stein is a former editor of the Journal and has also taught English and composition at the academic level. She currently runs a center for teaching English in México.
Identification
Copyright
© 2009 American Dietetic Association. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
