Culturally Diverse Nurses and the Meaning of Cultural Competence

Nurses are expected to demonstrate cultural competence to provide the most appropriate care to culturally different patients all over the globe. Awareness to the impact that the nurses culture has on the nurse/patient interaction is imperative for that. This phenomenological study was designed to explore experiences of Ethiopian Origin Registered Nurses in caring for people who are from different cultures than their own. The focus of the research was on their self-awareness in a culturally contextualized relationship of care giving. The findings revealed that the experience of caring for patients, from a culture different from the nurses culture, is an exhausting cognitive activity, involving constant attentiveness. The EORNs are highly aware that some of their nursing caring behaviors originate from their cultural heritage and able to differ between personal cultural values and generic cultural features. This self-awareness apparently forms the basis for the EORNs ability to develop skills of cultural competence.