Cultural Competency in South Africa: A nursing education perspective

Abstract

One of the biggest issues facing nursing education in recent times is the effort to develop more culturally sensitive graduates (Salminen, et al. 2010), against a view that cultural competency pedagogy is particularly inadequate in nursing, and this is the discourse that is primarily addressed in this paper. This paper argues incorporating cultural competency content into South African nursing education programmes. In support of this position, this paper thus discusses the significance of cultural competency to South African nursing education; expounds the existing cultural disparities in the country’s nursing education programmes; presents models of cultural competency which could be used in nursing education; proposes ways how cultural competency nursing education could be achieved; and points out the implications of this information for South African nursing.

Keywords: Nursing education, cultural competence, transcultural nursing, South Africa.