Nurses learn how to serve other cultures

Understanding other cultures, especially when it comes to medical care, is becoming an essential skill for area health practitioners, two seminar speakers said Tuesday.

“We need to learn the transition of how they (immigrants) think and how we think and try to cross that bridge between the two,” said Sheila Jones, a nurse with the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Health Department, “especially since about 75 percent of our clients in prenatal care and family planning are Hispanic.”

About 40 nurses and one social worker participated in the “Health and the Hispanic Culture,” seminar Tuesday morning, the first in the “Providing Leadership to Combat Health Risks and Threats to Our Families, Children and Communities” conference hosted by the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga School of Nursing.

“We have addressed cultural issues at different times before,” said Dr. Cherry Guinn, associate professor of nursing at UTC. “But what I wanted this time was to help them really get a handle on the most common Hispanic cultures in this area.”

Ada Baron, a Cuban native and nurse who works closely with the Hispanic community, said the Hispanic population has grown significantly in the last 10 years.

“We serve a large percentage of Hispanics as well as other cultures in Chattanooga, and we need to be able to serve those people because they are part of our community,” she said.

Ms. Baron talked about the area’s two main Hispanic communities, Mexicans and Guatemalans, and how Hispanics as a group view health care differently.

“Although not everything applies to everyone,” she said, “we tend to wait until the very last moment to seek medical attention.”

Among other things, she talked about how Hispanics ofen use natural herbs and healers to cure ailments.

The other speaker, Nikki Bautista, a high school Spanish teacher, talked about the basic skills needed to work with other cultures. She said it was important to recognize and learn about their culture.

Jessica Savage, a women’s health nurse practitioner at the Bradley County Health Department, said she attended the conference because she wants to understand and serve her patients better.

“I think it is really interesting what she said about being intercultural, more than multicultural,” Ms. Savage said.

Ms. Jones, meanwhile, said her biggest challenge as a nurse has been gaining the trust of the immigrant community.

The second part of the session covered women’s health, and the next two seminars on April 1 and 8 will discuss child safety and leadership issues.

POPULATION BY RACE

Hamilton County

* White: 74.1%

* Black: 20.6%

* Hispanic: 2.6%

* Asian: 1.6%

Bradley County

* White: 90.7%

* Black: 4.3%

* Hispanic: 3.1%

* Asian: 0.8%

Whitfield County

* White: 64.9%

* Hispanic: 29.3%

* Black: 3.8%

* Asian: 1.3%

Source: U.S. Census figures, 2006 estimate