Diversity in healthcare
Respond on or before Day 6 on 2 different days to at least two of your colleagues who were assigned a different patient than you. Critique your colleague’s targeted questions, and explain how the patient might interpret these questions. Explain whether any of the questions would apply to your patient, and why.
***Below is the post to create a response
Paloma Hernandez, 26 year-old, Spanish speaking patient who presents to the clinic for the last 2 days in a row complaining of abdominal pain that is getting worse. The first visit the staff relied on her younger bilingual daughter to translate. She was treated with Omeprazole and encouraged to take OTC medication. Today she presents with the same problem. Her daughter states it is the same problem but worse today.
Diversity in healthcare is important in order to effectively communicate and serve patients (Laureate Education, n.d.). Healthcare providers need to be culturally sensitive by being aware of the similarities and differences their patients may have from them, and this must be done in a non-judgemental manner (Laureate Education, n.d.). It is through cultural sensitivity that one can best treat patients wholly.
Ms. Hernandez is Spanish-speaking only and is Hispanic, these facts put her at risk for health disparities, increasing her risk for morbidity and mortality (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020). Latinos have poor health outcomes related to lack of access to healthcare and due to language and cultural barriers (Corvin et al., 2020). Communication and understanding are necessary to help understand and diagnose a patient adequately; utilizing the patient’s daughter to translate may result in omitting important symptoms, thus a third-party translator should be utilized. It is important to clarify the patient’s spiritual beliefs and the role they play in illness. Additionally, culture can influence the patient’s lifestyle as it pertains to diet. The latter items should be clarified to get a clear picture of the symptoms potentially contributing to Ms. Hernandez’s abdominal pain.
BUY A PLAGIARISM-FREE PAPER HERE
The following are questions that can be asked, among others:
Please rate your pain on a scale of 0-10 with 10 being the worst pain you have ever had.
Where on the abdomen does it hurt? Can you show me, please?
What precipitates the pain?
Describe the pain.
What kind of foods/drinks do you have on a daily basis?
One method to combat health disparities is to address the patient culturally sensitively. Understanding, and clarifying, the answers to the questions above will aid in the diagnosis of the health concern. One must also keep in mind the socioeconomic status, culture, and language of the patient as this can help with the diagnosis of health problems.
Most of your questions for the patients are on point and open-ended meaning that they are effective in obtaining adequate information that is critical in promoting patient care. Providers rely of adequate data from patients, more so those who maty not have adequately recorded files or those on their first visit. Some questions however may confuse the patient if they are not well conversant with matters on health. For instance, the question pertaining the kind of drinks or foods the patients take on a regular basis may be confusing if the patient does not relate the association between food and health. From empirical evidence, dietary habits have a direct implication on the health and wellbeing of a person therefore, questioning on the kind of foods your patient takes is a great decision.
Besides, some of the questions may be too complex for the patient to comprehend. The use of a complex medical language can be a barrier to effective communication with the patient (Tran & Sweeny, 2019). For instance, the question, “What precipitates the pain?” uses a complex language that a patient may not comprehend. Sometimes it is essential for healthcare providers to use the layman language to allow patients comprehend the questions with ease.
Some of the questions that may relate to my patient include the foods and dietary intake as well as factors the precipitate the pain and rating the pain on a scale. When assessing a patient who is in pain, the first parameter to obtain is the scale of their pain. The scale of the pain helps in the preliminary stages to understand the patient’s condition. Also, enquiring about the dietary food intake is essential because food intake significantly affect out health either in the positive or negative perspective (Nawab et al., 2018).
References
Nawab, J., Farooqi, S., Xiaoping, W., Khan, S., & Khan, A. (2018). Levels, dietary intake, and health risk of potentially toxic metals in vegetables, fruits, and cereal crops in Pakistan. Environmental science and pollution research, 25(6), 5558-5571.
Tran, B. Q., & Sweeny, K. (2019). Correlates of physicians’ and patients’ language use during surgical consultations. Health communication.