Heritage Assessment: Issues, Trends and Management

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Heritage Assessment: Issues, Trends and Management

Heritage Assessment

A heritage assessment is very useful for healthcare professionals because it provides them with an opportunity to find out a lot of health traditions that particular cultures have and then apply them to meet the needs of their customers (Kelly & Weber, 2013). As nurses are initially taught to respect customers cultural choices and take them into consideration when providing patients with required services, they are likely to benefit from this knowledge the most. This assessment facilitates the development of cultural competence and ensures that the professional is able to align clients health needs with their common practices and considerations regarding health maintenance, protection, and restoration. It shows the things consumers value the most and determines their attitudes to different interventions, which also guides nurses actions (Cherry & Jacob, 2016). If nurses utilize this information, they receive an opportunity to build positive relations with patients, which leads to better health outcomes.

In order to conduct a heritage assessment, professionals use a special tool, which allows to get to know individuals culture and health-related beliefs. Heritage assessment tool provides an opportunity to gather heritage of the particular community on the basis of a questionnaire filled out by its representatives. This paper will be focused on the tool offered by Spector (2000). It is made to gather the information about clients family, culture, social support, and religious beliefs. On the basis of the obtained information, disease prevention and health promotion will be discussed. It will be identified how the representatives of different cultures maintain their health on the everyday basis and restore it (Kelly, 2014). The heritage of three different families will be assessed. To ensure anonymity of the participants, they will be addressed as the Jones, the Browns, and the Millers.

Common Health Traditions

The Jones family lives in America for a long time. The parents came from Germany, which affected their health traditions. This family is not very big. Its members grew up in an urban area and continue living in it. They contact with other relatives from time to time, mainly using online communication. They visit those family members who live nearby weekly, as a rule. The Brown family lives in America since childhood. Originally, it came from Russia. Its members grew up in a town and lived there until they moved to the USA. The family does not have any relatives nearby and usually communicate with others using emails or skype. Finally, the Miller family came to the USA from Mexica 16 years ago. The members of the family interact on the everyday basis as they live nearby. They also contact those who live abroad monthly.

The families that were assessed have different views regarding health maintenance. The Jones family that represents German heritage tends to pay much attention to its physical health with the focus made on proper nutrition. Trying to follow a healthy diet, its members have meals at home as often as possible so that they have an opportunity to cook them themselves. In addition to that, the Jones are Christians. They attend their religious institution regularly and listen to their churchs counsel. For example, they do not imbibe harmful substances, such as alcohol drinks. The Scott family has a Russian-Caucasian heritage and does not maintain any religious practices actively. Its members do not consider nutrition to be extremely critical.

Even though they sometimes prepare foods of their ethnic background, they often make unhealthy nutrition choices because they believe that such food tastes better. While the Jones family mentioned that religious practices play a vital role in their health maintenance, the Scotts fail to notice it. The Miller family that has Latino heritage is closer to the Jones, in this perspective. It follows Catholicism and maintains some of its practices. The family thinks that their religion is connected with their health-related beliefs and decisions to some degree. From time to time, the family cooks those meals that represent their cultural heritage. Still, these meals are usually unhealthy and full of fat. They also do not consider that eating fast food rarely can spoil their health.

The Jones pay more attention to health protection than the Browns and the Millers, as they are more conscious of their diet. In addition to that, they follow religious practices that make them avoid drinking alcohol and smoking. The Brown family does not focus on the spiritual side of health protection. The Millers think that their faith and the practice of lent can make them protected from different issues, including diseases.

Considering health restoration, the Jones prefer to consult their family doctor when they have some issues. They consider that religion is not the only thing that can affect their health because it is even more critical to believe in the healthcare system and use the benefits it provides in addition to spirituality. The Browns tend to refer to self-treatment and utilize those practices that have been used by their relatives for many years and proved to be advantageous. The Millers consider that the body is capable of healing itself in the majority of cases. They tend to ignore modern medicine and have no health insurance. The family underlines the fact that people often get sick because of some supernatural causes that is why they require appropriate treatment practices that are not provided by the current healthcare system.

Those common health traditions observed in the Miller family reveal their Latino heritage greatly, showing that its members still follow their culture. They practice religion at home from time to time and involve their friends and family in these activities, as they live nearby and are representatives of the same cultural background. Such attitudes are highly appreciated by the rest of the family, including those who did not move to the USA. The Jones and the Browns are more affected by the way they treat and follow religion than by their heritage cultures. However, while the Jones celebrate Christmas and Easter because their church underlines the value of this holidays, the Browns do so just because of their cultural background and habit that was inherited from their relatives.

Thus, it can be concluded that three families from different cultures that participated in the heritage assessment tend to have different views regarding health maintenance, protection, and restoration. For example, the Jones and the Millers connect health protection with religious practices, while the Browns tend to pay a little more attention to their nutrition than to spirituality and are affected by cultural background and habits. The information obtained due to this assessment enhanced my understanding of cultural heritage and its connection with health decisions greatly. It made me realize that diverse background plays a critical role in the lives of people who are living on the same territory.

References

Cherry, B., & Jacob, S. (2016). Contemporary nursing: Issues, trends, & management. Amsterdam, Netherlands: Elsevier Health Sciences.

Kelly, C. (2014). Heritage assessment in nursing. Munich, Germany: GRIN Verlag GmbH.

Kelly, J., & Weber, J. (2013). Health assessment in nursing. New York, NT: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.

Spector, R. (2000). Heritage assessment tool. Web.

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