Cultural Comptency Online Course(s) & Continuing Education

The issue of lower breastfeeding rates in Appalachia goes beyond poverty – as many women in the region are willing to travel out of the area to receive good care. Why isn’t access to care easier to obtain in these rural areas? Why are women getting most of their prenatal education from their family members – making much of the education outdated and incorrect? Why have these women lost trust in their healthcare providers that are local?
The answers to these question reverts back to two major conclusions:

1. Women are still considered second class in Appalachia and;
2. Many healthcare providers do not understand Appalachian culture in order to serve them in the best way possible.

This presentation will discuss: a. What these specific barriers are; b. How we, as health professionals, can approach these barriers; c. How to help to create a new culture trend; and d. How to empower Appalachian women to take hone of their healthcare – specifically their birth and breastfeeding journey.

Providing Culturally Sensitive Care competency is a pressing and relevant topic in today’s multicultural communities. Healthcare workers are increasingly likely to work with persons of diverse backgrounds, including varying nationalities, races, and religions. These professionals must first be introduced to self-reflexive consideration of how their own self-selected, as well as socially assigned, identities effect their personal perceptions and biases. With an understanding of how they personally function within their private and professional lives they can then advance to exploring basic understandings of others and begin to work with a sense of “cultural humility” as they provide care. Together we will explore our individual webs of identity and discover how this impacts our perspectives of social justice.

Lactation professionals can provide invaluable assistance to Muslim families seeking to successfully breastfeed. However, cultural differences and a lack of understanding of Islamic culture could create barriers between professionals and the families they are trying to support. It is crucial that professionals and health care providers are aware of and acknowledge the unique role that culture and religion can play in this dynamic, both to prevent obstacles to breastfeeding and to encourage breastfeeding through culturally specific methods and arguments.

This presentation will show how to adapt your approach, language and content to ensure effective and sensitive care that will be more readily accepted by the mother and her family. It explores what the Qur’an says about breastfeeding and delves into traditional and cultural Islamic attitudes and practices surrounding breastfeeding. Moreover, it will explore the father’s role in Muslim culture and offer religious justification to encourage him to support breastfeeding, as well as issues of wet-nursing, milk sharing and adoption (as it relates to breastfeeding) within the Islamic context. As a participant, you will be encouraged to challenge your own assumptions about Islamic traditional and cultural practices and to use new knowledge gained to empower others to reflect on the benefits of being a culturally sensitive and responsive lactation professional and health care provider.