Are Hospitalized Patients Culturally Safe?

Abstract

My personal and professional experiences as a practitioner nurse, and a lecturer unveil that, in the present environment, patients, along with the fear of death and illness, face stressors such as being stranger to the treatment team, being unaware of the treatment process, fear of questioning, the unfamiliar environment of the hospital and its governing culture. In most cases, not only the values, beliefs and identities of patients are not taken into account in decision making, but also the atmosphere governing medical centers is somehow trying to instill their thoughts and beliefs in them. This makes decision-making solely on the basis of disease recognition, not pertaining to the patient’s requirements. In such an atmosphere, the possibility of the patient’s participation, cooperation and protection in daycare is threatened, and in many cases, it prevents follow-up and adherence to treatment and prevents us from the goal of improving the quality of patient-centered services with a view to clinical excellence. The concept of cultural safety, along with encouraging the practitioners to rethink, opens the way for the implementation and attainment of the ideals of emancipatory theory in nursing, which have been for years restricted to the scope of theoretical knowledge.