Couples, Families, & Health Culture, Personality, Health, and Family Dynamics: Cultural Competence in the Selection of Culturally Sensitive Treatments

Cultural sensitivity and cultural competence in the selection of culturally sensitive treatments is a requisite for effective counseling practice in working with diverse clients and their families, particularly when clients present with health issues or medical problems. Described here is a strategy for selecting culturally sensitive treatments (cultural interventions, culturally sensitive interventions, or culturally sensitive therapy) based on a comprehensive assessment of cultural factors, personality dynamics, family dynamics, and health or medical conditions. A case example is provided that illustrates this strategy. Keywords acculturation, cultural sensitivity, cultural competency, cultural interventions, culturally sensitive interventions, culturally sensitive therapy Although most clinicians report that cultural sensitivity and culturally sensitive treatments are important in providing cultu-rally competent care to clients, couples, and families, very few clinicians report that they actually provide culturally sensitive treatment (Hansen et al., 2006). Arguably, there are various reasons for this, but a likely explanation is that few clinician