Transcultural Nursing : A Review of the Literature

A review of transcultural nursing literature examines the language and theories of transcultural care, clinical aspects and interventions, and related concepts such as cultural shock, conflict, blindness, imposition, and ethnocentrism. The development of transcultural nursing is traced from a vague idea about human interactions, through research, to acceptance by the nursing community as a distinct subfield, and integration into nursing education. Experiences within the larger American culture and in diverse cultural groups are explored for insights applicable to cross-cultural nursing experiences. Writings of the leading authors in transcultural nursing are reviewed for their contributions \u27to the development of transcultural nursing. Leininger, the foremost author, facilitated the development of concepts and terms intrinsic to transcultural nursing. Her prolific writings detailing these concepts and terms are examined. Studies documenting the importance of cultural patterns and conditioning and literature detailing the development of transcultural nursing interventions are reviewed. Interventions appropriate to a specific cultural group, Indochinese patients in the United States, are suggested as an example of transcultural nursing care. The manner in which man seeks to understand his body, its functions and the natural and supernatural contexts in which his body is located, are cultural aspects of man, and as such are avenues for further research in transcultural care. Transcultural nursing encourages nurses to utilize the nursing process, from assessment through evaluation, in a multicultural perspective. Providing nursing care to patients of different cultures requires a sensitivity to needs and behaviors unique to the cultural group. Without an understanding of the impact of culture on all aspects of human life, nursing interventions may be rendered ineffective, misunderstood, or rejected. Transcultural nursing seeks to understand the needs of patients within the framework of their culture and to design nursing interventions effective within and sensitive to the constraints of this framework, and to promote understanding and acceptance of the cultural diversity of man