Transcultural nursing is an essential aspect of healthcare today. The ever increasing multicultural population in different countries poses a significant challenge to nurses providing individualize and holistic care to the patients. This requires the nurses to recognize
and appreciate cultural differences in healthcare values, beliefs and customs. Nurses must acquire the necessary knowledge and skills in cultural competency. Culturally competent nursing care helps ensure patient satisfaction and positive outcomes. Transcultural nursing shows how professional nursing interacts with the concept of culture. MAJOR CONCEPTS: Illness and wellness are shaped by a various factors including perception and coping skills, as well as the social level of the patient. Cultural competence is an important component of nursing. Culture influences all spheres of human life. It defines health, illness, and the search for relief from disease or distress. Religious and Cultural knowledge is an important ingredient in health care. The health concepts held by many cultural groups may result in people choosing not to seek modern medical treatment procedures. Health care provider need to be flexible in the design of programs, policies, and services to meet the needs and concerns of the culturally diverse population, groups that are likely to be encountered. Most cases of lay illness have multiple causalities and may require several different approaches to diagnosis, treatment, and cure including folk and Western medical interventions.. The use of traditional or alternate models of health care delivery is widely varied and may come into conflict with western models of health care practice. Culture guides behavior into acceptable ways for the people in a specific group as such culture originates and develops within the social structure through inter personal interactions. For a nurse to successfully provide car for a client of a different cultural or ethnic to background, effective intercultural communication must take place.
Key words: TRANSCULTURAL NURSING THEORY,
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