Question 1

The nurse is providing diabetic diet teaching to a Hispanic man and his wife.When the nurse is discussing foods that are acceptable,the wife continues to interrupt with statements like,"Oh,he doesn't eat that," or,"All he eats is rice and beans." What should the nurse do?

Accepted Answer

The nurse should refer the patient to speak with a dietitian who is familiar with cultural food choices.If possible,he/she should develop a diet plan that includes the patient's cultural diet preferences and can provide culturally sensitive teaching brochures that describe healthy food choices.Rice and beans may be acceptable alternatives in a balanced diet.The nurse should include people in the family who help shop for and prepare food in the home,along with the wife.

Question 2

According to the Office of Minority Health (OMH),the thoughts,communications,actions,customs,beliefs,values,and institutions of racial,ethnic,religious,or social groups are known as

Accepted Answer

The OMH describes culture as the thoughts,communications,actions,customs,beliefs,values,and institutions of racial,ethnic,religious,or social groups.Subcultures represent various ethnic,religious,and other groups with distinct characteristics from the dominant culture.Ethnicity refers to a shared identity related to social and cultural heritage such as values,language,geographical space,and racial characteristics.Cultural backlash occurs when an individual rejects a new culture because experience with a new or different culture is extremely negative.

Question 3

In comparing American culture with Asian cultures,which of the following statements is true?

Accepted Answer

Among Asian cultures,face-saving communication promotes harmony through indirect,ambiguous communication and conflict avoidance.American culture supports individualism,where people value assertive communication because it manifests the ideals of individual autonomy and self-determination.

Question 4

When asked to describe the differences between ethnicity and race,what should the student nurse explain?

Accepted Answer

Ethnicity refers to a shared identity related to social and cultural heritage such as values,language,geographical space,and racial characteristics.Ethnicity is different from race,which is limited to the common biological attributes shared by a group such as skin color or blood type.In any intercultural encounter,there is an insider or native perspective (ethic worldview)and an outsider's perspective (ethic worldview).Ethnicity is best understood by those who are a part of that ethnicity and have an "emic" worldview.

Question 5

The nurse is caring for a member of the Jewish faith who needs to undergo a critical procedure on Saturday.The patient is refusing the procedure because it is scheduled to be done on the Sabbath.The nurse impresses on the patient the urgency of the procedure,stating that delaying the procedure would put his life at risk.The patient continues to refuse.What should the nurse do?

Accepted Answer

Nurses need to identify and contact patients' religious and spiritual leaders before problems occur.Nurses work with these leaders to mediate in times of crises.Canceling the procedure may occur,but not at this time.Doing so prematurely could lead to the patient's death.A family member cannot make decisions for a competent patient.Having the procedure done against the patient's wishes cannot be done.

Question 6

Care that includes the nurse learning about cultural issues involved in the patient's health care belief system and enable patients and families to achieve meaningful and supportive care is known as

Accepted Answer

The goal of transcultural nursing is culturally congruent care,or care that fits the person's valued life patterns and set of meanings.Culturally competent care reflects the ability of a nurse to bridge cultural gaps in caring and enables patients and families to achieve meaningful and supportive caring.It is a step toward reaching culturally congruent care.Ethnocentrism is a tendency to hold one's own way of life as superior to those of others.It is the cause of biases and prejudices.Cultural imposition is the use of one's own values and lifestyles as the absolute guide in dealing with patients and interpreting behaviors.

Question 7

When caring for a patient of a different culture,it is important for the nurse to understand that

Accepted Answer

Working with established family hierarchy prevents delays and achieves better patient outcomes.Nurses need to determine who has authority for making decisions within the family and how to communicate with the proper individuals.Do not assume that just because the woman is the primary caregiver,she will make decisions independently.Determine the family social hierarchy as soon as possible.Gender also differentiates role expectations.

Question 8

Eliminating disparities in the health status of people from diverse racial,ethnic,and cultural backgrounds has become one of the two most important priorities of Healthy People 2020 because populations with health disparities have

Accepted Answer

Populations with health disparities have a significantly increased incidence of disease or increased morbidity and mortality when compared with the general population.

Question 9

Despite significant improvements in the overall health status of the U.S.population over the past few decades,disparities among ethnic and racial minorities have

Accepted Answer

Despite significant improvements in the overall health status of the U.S.population over the past few decades,the persistence of disparities in health status among ethnic and racial minorities continues to be a serious local and national challenge.Hispanics,African Americans,and some Asian subgroups are less likely than non-Hispanic whites to have a high school education and often experience poorer access to care and lower quality of preventive,primary,and specialty care.

Question 10

Providing culturally congruent care means providing care that

Accepted Answer

The goal of transcultural nursing is culturally congruent care,or care that fits the person's valued life patterns and set of meanings.Patterns and meanings are generated from people themselves,rather than from predetermined criteria.Culturally congruent care is sometimes different from the values and meanings of the professional health care system.Ethnocentrism is a tendency to hold one's own way of life as superior to those of others.It is not part of culturally congruent care.

Question 11

The nurse is caring for a Native American who has had recent surgery.In the patient's culture,it is a sign of weakness to complain of pain.In the nurse's culture,people who are having pain ask for pain medicine.The nurse has assumed that the patient has not been having pain and does not need medication because he has not complained of pain.What is the nurse doing?

Accepted Answer

Health care practitioners who have cultural ignorance or cultural blindness about differences generally resort to cultural imposition and use their own values and lifestyles as the absolute guide in dealing with patients and interpreting their behaviors.Culturally competent care is the care provided by the nurse who attempts to bridge cultural gaps in caring,work with cultural differences,and enable patients and families to achieve meaningful and supportive caring.The nurse in this case has not been able to do this.Any intercultural encounter consists of an inside or native perspective (emic worldview)and an outsider's perspective (ethic worldview).The nurse is obviously utilizing an ethic worldview.The nurse may be acultural,but she/he did not purposefully ignore the patient's need.

Question 12

In performing a cultural assessment,knowledge of a patient's country of origin and its history and ecological contexts is known as

Accepted Answer

Knowledge of a patient's country of origin and its history and ecological contexts is significant to health care and is known as ethnic heritage and ethnohistory.Biocultural history identifies a patient's health risks related to the ecological context of the culture.Social organization refers to units of organization in a cultural group defined by kinship status and appropriate roles for their members.Religious and spiritual beliefs are major influences in the patient's worldview about health and illness,pain and suffering,and life and death.Nurses need to understand the emic perspective of their patients.

Question 13

Compare the following statements.Which are considered predominant in non-Western cultures?

Accepted Answer

Many non-Western cultures see the cause of illness as being an imbalance between humans and nature.Method of diagnosis is described as holistic,and treatment of illness is mixed to include magico-religious,supernatural herbal,biomedical,etc.Western cultures view the cause of illness as biomedical using scientific,high-tech methods of diagnosis.

Question 14

The nurse is caring for a patient who does not speak English.She decides to use an interpreter to explain procedures and to answer questions that the patient may have.In performing the interview,what should the nurse do?

Accepted Answer

If the patient needs an interpreter,the nurse should ensure gender,age,and ethnic compatibility of the interpreter with the patient's preference and the topic of discussion.The nurse should direct questions to the patient and not to the interpreter and should have the interpreter ask the patient for feedback and clarification at regular intervals,not only at the end.

Question 15

The nurse is caring for a Chinese patient who is reluctant to answer questions about her health background.The nurse asks the patient if she would like her husband present when health questions are asked.The nurse does this knowing that the Chinese culture is a collectivistic and patrilineal culture.What does this mean?

Accepted Answer

In collectivistic cultures,families are made up of distant blood relatives across three generations and fictive or nonblood kin.Kinship extends to both the father's and the mother's side of the family (bilineal)or is limited to the side of either father (patrilineal)or mother (matrilineal).Patrilineally extended families exist among Chinese and Hindus,where a woman moves into her husband's clan after marriage and minimizes ties with her own parents and siblings.

Question 16

The nurse is caring for a patient who has emigrated from another country.The patient is in need of abdominal surgery but seems reluctant to sign the surgical permits.What is one tactic that the nurse should use?

Accepted Answer

Nurses should determine the family social hierarchy as soon as possible to prevent offending patients and their families.Working with established family hierarchy prevents delays and achieves better patient outcomes.Encouraging the patient to sign against her social beliefs can cause familial strife.Explaining the level of jeopardy may create undue stress.Nurses should be able to determine the correct hierarchy and should not involve the physician at this time.

Question 17

Which statement is true relative to caring for a Hindu patient who is dying?

Accepted Answer

The family of a dying Hindu remains at the bedside to place a drop of the holy water from the River Ganges on the patient's lips immediately after death to help his or her soul to the next life.The family of a critically ill Jewish patient will turn his or her head eastward or to the right side.A dying Hispanic patient will not be left alone,so that a close kin is able to hear the patient's wishes,allowing the soul to leave in peace.Anointing of the sick is a Roman Catholic sacrament.

Question 18

The nurse is caring for a patient of Asian descent who speaks very little English.The nurse is especially concerned and attempts to develop a trusting relationship with the patient.She does this knowing that

Accepted Answer

In contrast to other types of interviews,cultural assessment is intrusive and time-consuming and requires a trusting relationship between participants.Miscommunication commonly occurs in intercultural interactions as the result of language and communication differences between and among participants,as well as differences in interpreting each other's behaviors.The goal is to generate knowledge about the patient's values,beliefs,and practices about nursing and health care.

Question 19

Foster (1976)identified two distinct categories of healers cross-culturally.Of the following characteristics,which are congruent with the healing practices of naturalistic practitioners?

Accepted Answer

Naturalistic practitioners attribute illness to natural,impersonal,and biological forces that cause alteration in the equilibrium of the human body.Healing emphasizes use of naturalistic modalities,including herbs,chemicals,heat,cold,massage,and surgery.In contrast,personalistic practitioners believe that an external agent,which can be human (i.e.,sorcerer)or nonhuman (e.g.,ghosts,evil,deity),causes health and illness.Personalistic beliefs emphasize the importance of humans' relationships with others,both living and deceased,and with their deities.

Question 20

Leininger (1991)identified three nursing decision and action modes to achieve culturally congruent care.These modes are "cultural care preservation or maintenance," "cultural care accommodation," and "cultural care repatterning." When assessing patients during the admission process,the nurse utilizes

Accepted Answer

Nurses are able to use any or all of these action modes simultaneously.These actions require that nurses have knowledge of the patient's culture and have the willingness,commitment,and skills to work with patients and families in decision making.The outcome sought through these actions and decisions is meaningful,supportive,and facilitative care as judged by the patient.

Quiz 9: Culture and Ethnicity