Cultural competence in mental health care

Both health care providers and clients are influenced by their respective cultures during a client encounter. Practitioners should consider the client's culture as a potential factor in determining their views on mental disorders and how the disorder should be managed (discussed further in Module 8). Service providers also need to be wary of broad generalizations, however, as immigrants and refugees can differ significantly; generalized labels do not reflect the complexity of each person's experience.

Service provision and ultimately, client outcomes, can be improved by incorporating cultural competence.

Although there are a number of ways to incorporate more culturally sensitive health care practices, it is important to recognize that cultural competency is multi-layered, involving the system, the health care provider and the individual client (Betancourt et al., 2003; Fung et al., 2012; Kirmayer, 2001). Cultural competency in health care “acknowledges and incorporates—at all levels—the importance of cultural assessment of cross-cultural relations, vigilance toward the dynamics that result from cultural differences, expansion of cultural knowledge, and adaptation of services to meet culturally unique needs” (Betancourt et al., 2003:294).