HIPAA News

HCCS Partners With UHC to Deliver Cultural Competency Courses

(March 27, 2008)-- HCCS (Health Care Compliance Strategies, provider of online healthcare compliance and competency training,  announced a partnership with University HealthSystem Consortium (UHC) to deliver a suite of courses in cultural competency. The suite consists of 11 courses with multimedia content and healthcare specific case studies that are appropriate for clinical and non-clinical staff. The courses were created with the assistance of leading experts in the cultural competency field.

"As experts in healthcare learning, HCCS is excited to partner with such a well respected organization as UHC," says Ben Diamond, President of HCCS. "The addition of these cultural competency courses to our growing list of course offerings is directly in line with our mission to assist our clients to improve the quality of care through effective learning tools."

The first course "Diversity and Cultural Competency: Introduction" is an introductory course covering the importance of diversity sensitivity and cultural competency in the healthcare workplace and strategies for
improving interactions with coworkers and patients. It also covers the business rational for addressing these concerns. The Cultural Competence in Health Care suite also provides e-learning courses covering nine cultures: African American, Anglo American, Asian, South Asian, Hispanic, Middle Eastern, Native American, Russian and Southeast Asian. Finally, the suite offers "Working with Interpreters (for LEP Patients)", a course to educate providers on how to effectively work with interpreters for patients with limited English proficiency (LEP).

The new course offerings enable healthcare organizations to address state requirements for multicultural training of healthcare professionals in states such as New Jersey, California and Washington. Other states, such as Arizona, Illinois, New York and Ohio, are in the process of enacting similar regulations. In addition, understanding the customs and behaviors of other cultures can lead to significantly better patient care. Delivering care to patients in a culturally and linguistically appropriate manner is viewed by The Joint Commission as an important safety and quality issue.

"When misunderstandings occur between patients and healthcare professionals, it can lead to medical errors, impact treatment options, offend or cause patients embarrassment, violate their privacy, and
ultimately, can cause patients to either seek medical care elsewhere, or not seek care at all when they should." says Ben Diamond. "It is to the benefit of all healthcare organizations to train their staff to recognize
various cultural differences so the quality of patient care and provider patient communications are not impacted in a negative manner."

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