Cultural Health Care Needs in Nursing: Unique Needs of Different Cultures

Running head: NURSING
Nursing
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1NURSING
Introduction
Cultural safety presents the principal philosophical shift from delivering care to the
patient regardless of their difference in the cultural and spiritual values and this mainly take
into account of the unique needs of the patients (Hemberg & Vilander, 2017). The following
assignment aims to explore the unique cultural needs of the people in order to increase the
provision of the culturally safe care plan. The assignment will highlight three different
cultural needs that differ from the Australian healthcare needs, models or guidelines. This
will be followed by the analysis of the differing needs and the role of the registered nursing
(RN) professionals in order to implement culturally safe and effective care plan.
Cultural Health Care Need 1
Beginnings of Life and Parenthood: Contraception is not accepted in some
religions/cultures
There are many kind of contraceptive methods practiced in Australia like male and
female condoms, emergency contraception pills and intrauterine devices (copper and
hormonal). However, the concept of contraception is some-what complicated in the Islamic
culture. Muslims strive for building strong family and community bonds and they consider
children as a gift from Allah. The Qur’an does not specifically refer in favour of the family
planning or contraception however, is against infanticide. Qur’an warms Muslims not to kill
their children. Do not kill your children for fear of want." "We provide sustenance for them
and for you” (6:151, 17:31). This particular phrase is misinterpreted by few Muslims, and
thus, raising issues against contraception. Thus, the cultural healthcare need under this
context is promotion of the unregulated birth without any use of the birth control pills and
maintaining a bid family with many earning members. According to the Australian

2NURSING
Healthcare and Hospitals Association (2016) the Australian healthcare needs mainly promote
community based health awareness program in order to reduce the chances of unwanted or
unplanned pregnancies and thereby helping to reduce the rate of spread of the chronic
diseases. Tigabu et al. (2018) are of the opinion that the lack of use of the contraception or
unprotected sex among the Muslim communities also increases the vulnerability of
developing sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Tigabu et al. (2018) further highlighted
that despite large-scale investment in the access of the contraceptives, unintended
pregnancies, uncontrolled population growth and sexually transmitted disease among the
population of the Middle East residing in Australia is posing a significant healthcare problem.
The cultural and religious influences restrict the use of the contraception. The Australian
Government, Department of Health (2011) has their own national strategies (2010 to 2013) in
order to prevent the spread of HIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, syphilis and herpes simplex virus
and Chlamydia infection. Australian Government also observes National STI Sexual Health
Campaign for over four years in order to prevent STIs.
In order to provide culturally safe healthcare for prevention of the STIs and
uncontrolled growth among the Muslim populations, it is the duty of the registered nurse
(RN) to conduct community based health education program. This kind of program will help
to raise awareness among the mass in the domain of the side-effects of the unprotected sex.
The community based health education program will be structured in the presence of the
culturally competent nursing professionals mainly from the Muslim origin. This will help in
framing of the educational program based in the religious and the cultural thoughts of the
Muslims. There will be separate health education program for the men and the women. This
is because, under the Muslim religion, people are not comfortable in discussing sex or
gynecological issues with opposite sex. Thus separate health education and awareness
program will be helpful in increase the spontaneous participation of both men and women

3NURSING
while raising awareness about contraception and importance of protected sex. It would be the
duty of the Aboriginal nursing professionals to design the health promotion program in such a
way that it makes use of the colloquial language under the execution of the effective
communication skills (Vu et al., 2016). Shirazi, Shirazi and Bloom (2015) are of the opinion
that the use of the effective communication skills help in the development of the therapeutic
relationship with the client and thereby helping to increase the indulgence in the health
promotion program. The use of the power-point presentation (audio-visual presentation)
followed by the interactive sessions will be helpful in promoting health awareness. Under the
community-based health education program, the main motion of education will focus why
health is important for comprehensive well-being and who health is linked with attaining
supreme spirituality. This is popularly known as faith-based framework (Wolf et al., 2017).
Cultural Health Care Need 2
Medical Intervention: A person who identifies as a Jehovah's Witness unable to have any
blood products
A small group of patients refuse to undertake blood transfusion therapy and are
usually based on certain specific religious beliefs or faith known of Jehovah’s Witness (JW).
This group of people believes that Bible is the true word of God. They do not celebrate
birthday or Christmas and nor do they salute flags for vote in public elections. They nurture
the belief that since blood is the principal source of life, one must not eat or consume blood
(by the means of blood transfusion) and anyone to consume it, must be cut-off.