The National CLAS Standards focus on improving health care quality and helping in the eradication of health care discrepancies (Purnell, 2014). CLAS offers a framework for persons and health care stakeholders to apply socially and linguistically suitable amenities (Giger, 2012). Implementation of these principles will enhance better wellbeing and health care in the USA. In the article below, one of the fifteen CLAS standards is selected for analysis.
The 13th rule is chosen for this assignment. The principle helps the community to plan, assess strategies, and engage in services meant to safeguard cultural and linguistic suitability (Ludwig-Beymer, 2014). The Amish American culture is distinctive from other cultures. Unlike other American cultures, the Amish culture is conservative. The community has not embraced modern technologies in transport and communication. Similarly, the community encourages their children to drop out of school in the eighth grade. Teenagers abandon their education programs to work on farms. The community also believes in the use of alternative medicines. By implementing the 13th standard, health care stakeholders will be able to come up with more open and trusting relations with the patients from the community (Ludwig-Beymer, 2014). Through collaboration with the community in developing health strategies, medical staff like nurses will be able to acquire knowledge of society’s health care beliefs. Familiarity with these dogmas will enable nurses to offer culturally sensitive care (Purnell, 2014). Nursing care that safeguards cultural and linguistic suitability encourages the conservative community to feel more contented in the contemporary health care setting.
The standard illustrated above should be utilized in implementing culturally competent care in the Amish American community. All nurses assigned to them must be conversant with the Amish cultures (Purnell, 2014). Although they are not expected to be acquainted with all the community’s cultural values, they should show admiration to their values for holistic care. Nurses should also be familiar with the community’s alternative medicine. In this regard, nurses should find ways of inquiring from their patients whether they are using the alternative medication without intimidating them. During the inquiries, they should show respect to the clients’ choice of medications. Equally, to implement culturally competent care in the community nurses should show respect to the community’s values and beliefs (Purnell, 2014). Respectful behavior will enable nurses to uphold their rights and show admiration to all Amish patients irrespective of their cultural backgrounds.
While implementing competent care in the Amish community, nurses should expect cultural differences as their biggest challenge. For instance, it is widely believed that progressive education aids communities to normalize their cultures with the societies (Purnell, 2014). However, schooling among the Amish people is limited. Children are encouraged to drop out at the eighth-grade level. Because of this, the Amish people’s potential and academic dreams are restricted. Similarly, their understanding of physiology and the health care system is limited (Ludwig-Beymer, 2014). Based on the above illustrations, nurses should expect challenges when caring for Amish patients. For example, their limited knowledge of physiology encourages them to select alternative medicines and not conventional drugs (Giger, 2012). Besides, members of this community are very conservative. Because of this, they possibly will not reveal all the required information during their appointments with health care providers. The above may result in hazardous interactions or wrongful diagnoses. However, appropriate implementation of the 13th rule will enhance better wellbeing and health care in the Amish American society.
References
Giger, J. (2012). Transcultural nursing: Assessment & intervention (6th ed.). St. Louis, Mo.: Mosby.
Ludwig-Beymer, P. (2014). Health Care Reform and the Transcultural Nurse. Journal of Transcultural Nursing, 3(1), 323-324.
Purnell, L. (2014). Guide to Culturally Competent Health Care. Philadelphia: Davis Company.