It is possible for health policies to fail due to cultural factors. This is because when looking at the anthropological history of United States (US) and the world at large, we can see how according to Campbell (2011), that even attempting to comprehend disease etiology among certain population, public health experts often use what is named as, “multifactorial model of disease.” This is a model of different factors that believed to bring about infection in population. Culture is appeared to be one of these contributed but distinct factors of multifactorial model. This model likewise seems to be in accordance with previous medical anthropological research in clinically applied anthropology.
The analysis of multifactorial model can easily ascertain the effectiveness of using social sciences, such as anthropology on a clinical level to decrease the influence of cultural dynamic on disease occurrence. The research of Yu (2001) focuses on the national standards for providing culturally and linguistically appropriate health care in the US. The author has set a foundational approach for understanding and developing health policies that get to the support of the communities.
U.S. is faced with different challenges when it comes to the influences on community diversities and cultural interactions. U.S. is becoming more diverse demographically, with racial and ethnic factions that are foreseeable to become the mainstream of the U.S. population by 2042. This potential approach could be the biological of the newfangled concept, personally known as the evolving majority.
Culturally appropriate health policy is a mutual decision-making; that is of community interest, cultural-favorable, society-adaptable, and most importantly, valued by all members of population subgroups. Demographics are the traits of a human population. Demographic data is useful in the assessment and development of community-wide health policies. demographic data may consist of age, disability, race, gender, income, mobility, home ownership, location, employment status, and/or educational level (Kronenfeld, 2010, p. 56-58). The data will then be used to develop and regulate public health policy trends. Eventually, these trends pronounce the changes that may occur in certain demographic populations. This is especially true because experts in demographics are often used in health public policy, sociology, and health marketing. A demographic profile, commonly referred to as a “demographic,” provides necessary information about a classic member of a certain group and to create pictorial imaginary, collectively. A public health policy may focus on members of chronic disorder at demographic population that are male, single, between the ages of 18-24, and college cultivated.
As an advocate of culturally-supportive health policy, there are five skills of consideration when developing or participating in culturally appropriate health policies:
- Ability to professionally and effectively socialize with community leaders in a public fashion, and influence fellow team members in the development of operative public policy.
- Ability to make dreams come true by planning, researching, reviewing, and executing, not by theory or opinion in considering health public agendas.
- Ability to perfect new innovations for the public and for potential realization of public success.
- The support of diversity approach in the healthcare sector needs to be embraced at all levels of management. This culturally competent approach can be applied to healthcare management workforce, such as academia and public policy makers.
- The ability to understand that not all health-related situations are the same. Therefore, approaching health policies specific to situation is safer than general policies to specific situation.
Additionally, potential solution to combating healthcare disparities is the implementation of health policies for recruiting underrepresented minorities in the field of healthcare. Multi-cultural decision-makers can best implement cultural diversity initiatives in many healthcare facilities. The staffing, preservation, and sustenance of understated minority students of different ethnicity to participate in decision-making process is crucial to achieving ethnically suitable health guidelines—– an added approach to developing culturally appropriate health policies.
Work Cited:
Campbell, D. (2011). Anthropology’s contribution to public health policy development. McGill Journal of Medicine, 13(1), 76.
Kronenfeld, J. J. (2010). The Impact of Demographics on Health and Healthcare: Race, Ethnicity and Other Social Factors (Research in the Sociology of Health Care). (pp. 56-58). New York, NY: Bingley: Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
Yu, X. (2001). National Standards for Providing Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Health Care: Policy Implications for Nursing. Nursing Economic, 19(5), 240.
