Sociocultural Aspects of Maternal and Child Health Nursing

CHAPTER 2 : Sociocultural Aspects of Maternal and Child Health Nursing
Key Terms :
Culture : is a view of the world and a set of traditions that a specific social group uses and transmits to the next generation.
Cultural Values : are preferred ways of acting based on traditions .
Cultural values are formed early in life and strongly influence the manner in which people plan for childbearing and childrearing , as well as they respond to health and wellness ( Whitler and Kirmayer, 2008)
Ethnicity : refers to the cultural group into which a person was born .
Mores or Norms : usual values of a group .
Taboos : actions that are not acceptable to a culture.
Three taboos are universal are murder , incest , and cannibalism.
Issues such as abortion , robbery , and lying are controversial because these are taboos to some people not to everyone.
Cultural differences occur not only across different ethnic backgrounds but also different lifestyle behaviors such as drinking alcohol or smoking cigarettes.
Diversity : means there is a mixture or variety of lifestyle and beliefs in population.
Transcultural Nursing : Nursing care that is guided by cultural aspects and respects individual differences .

Nursing Process Overview
( FOR RESPECTING SOCIOCULTURAL ASPECTS OF CARE)

ASSESMENT :
Assessment of socio-cultural factors is important to be certain that is care is planned based not on predetermined assumptions but on the actual preferences of a family.
Assess each client individually, not as one a group. Assessing the culture of the community is as important as assessing individual families because families are intrinsically joined to their community.
NSG. Diagnosis : Several nsg.dx speak to the consequences of ignoring cultural preferences in care:
Powerless r/d to expectations of care not being respected .., etc
Planning : Needs to be very specific for individual families because socio-cultural preferences tend to be very personal.
The plan of care may include arranging for variations in policy, such as length of family visiting hours , types of food served , or type of child care provided.
Implementation :
Appreciate that cultural values are usually unchangeable.
Evaluation :
Assessing whether expected outcomes have been met should reveal that a family’s socio-cultural preferences were considered and respected during care.

SOCIOCULTURAL DIFFERENCES AND IMPLICATIONS FOR DIVERSITY IN MATERNAL AND CHILD HEALTH NSG.

Stereotyping : means expecting a person to act in characteristic way without regard to his individual traits. e.g., men are not supposed to put diaper on babies.
Acculturation : refers to the loss of ethnic traditions in this way. e.g. Filipino acquired the Japanese culture.
Enculturation : refers to adaptation of ethnic traditions by other group of people. e.g. Europeans acquired the Filipino culture.
Cultural assimilation : means that people have adopted the values of dominant culture.
Prejudice : believing that some people are less than others on their physical and cultural traits.
Discrimination : is the act of treating people differently based on their physical and cultural traits.

RELATED TOPICS ;

Sociocultural Assessment :
Assessing families regarding whether there are socioeconomic or cultural influences that will make special considerations of care necessary.

“Assessing Sociocultural status, ethnicity, and cultural beliefs of families and clients can reveal why people take the type of preventive health measures that they do or seek a particular type of care for illness, because the way people react to health care is cultural value.” (Crombleholme, 2009)

Communication Patterns : not only what people say but also how they say it .
Language used.
Time Orientation : Differ on beliefs of the client .e.g. Americans and Japanese are punctual with their appointments. Another way that time orientation differs is in whether a culture concentrates on the past, the present, or the future.
Work and school orientation :
People in united states are supposed to work , they are also expected to finish school so they can learn an occupation and support themselves in their adult life. e.g. The predominant culture in the united states stresses that everyone should be employed be employed productively (called the Protestant work ethic) and that work be a pleasure and valued in itself (as important as the product of the work). Other culture do not value work in itself but see it as only a means to an end (you work to get money or food, not satisfaction).
Family Orientation : Family structure and the roles of family members are other lifestyle that are culturally determined. (Please see different types of families) Male and Female Roles : In most culture , man is the dominant figure.
In such a culture, if approval for hospital admission or therapy is needed , the man is the one who gives this approval. In a culture in which men are very dominant and women are extremely passive, a woman may be unable to offer an opinion of her own health or be embarrassed to submit to a physical examination, especially from a male physician or nurse practitioner, unless a female nurse is also present. In contrast, in some cultures, the woman may be the dominant person in the family. The oldest woman in the home would be the one to give consent for treatment or hospital admission.
Religion :
Religion guides a person’s overall life philosophy. It influences how people feel about health and illness, what foods they eat, and their preferences about birth and death rituals. E.g. Saksi ni Jehovah refused blood transfusion. Health Beliefs : Are not universal . It is generally assumed in developed in countries that illness is caused by documented factors such as bacteria, viruses, or trauma. In other countries, however, illness may be viewed primarily as punishment from God or an evil spirit, or as the work of a person who wishes to harm to the sick persons
Nutrition Practices : Food and their methods of preparation are strongly culturally related. E.g. Food and their methods of preparation are strongly culturally related Pain Responses :
A person’s response to pain is a final category that is both individually and culturally determined (Jacob et al., 2008). Although all people may have the same threshold sensation (the amount of stimulus that results in pain), their pain threshold (the point at which the individual reports that a stimulus is painful) and pain tolerance (the point at which an individual withdraws from a stimulus) vary greatly.
Strategies to help recognize cultural influences on pain perception are to:
a. appreciate that the meaning of pain varies among cultures;
b. appreciate that not all people communicate or express their level of pain in the same way;
c. recognize that communication of pain may not even be acceptable within a culture;
d. develop an awareness of your personal values and beliefs and that they may affect how you respond to people in pain; and
e. use an assessment tool, such as 1-10 scale, to assist in measuring pain so you are certain that you are being objective as possible.