Key assumptions of Leininger’s Culture Care theory
The Leininger’s Culture Care theory or Transcultural Nursing was developed by Madeleine Leininger, an accomplished nurse, and educator. The development of the theory was inspired by the desire to understand the varying patient factors that affect their healing, wellness, and healing. The model attempts to develop nursing care based on cultural congruency where nursing care decisions are personalized and in line with the lifeway, beliefs, and cultural values of individual patients (Wehbe-Alamah, 2018). The main objective of the theory is to deliver meaningful and high-quality nursing care even when patients have varying cultural backgrounds. To successfully achieve this objective, the theory relies heavily on several assumptions. The purpose of this paper is to explore the assumptions.
The first assumption is that care is perceived and practiced differently depending on culture but the communities also share some similarities concerning the care. The second assumption of the model is that the practices, values, and beliefs for culturally congruent care are based on the perception of language, worldviews, kinship, educational, political, ethnological, economical, ethnohistorical, and technological aspect of culture (Wehbe-Alamah, 2018). Another assumption is that some of the ways in which care is expressed are through varying patterns, lifestyles, meanings, actions, and expressions even though nursing care is a universal phenomenon. The transcultural nursing theory is also built on the assumption that every culture has its own folk heath care practices and that there is a variation of professional practice across different cultures even though there must be both cultural differences and similarities between the professional caregivers and receivers.
The next assumption of the model is that nursing practices share a central purpose of service to humanity in its role as a profession and discipline that runs across cultures. This implies that beneficial healthy and culturally based nursing care plays a big role in the well-being of clients regardless of whether they are groups, communities, institutions, families, or individuals as they interact with their environment. The next assumption is that nursing care lacks cultural congruency in terms of beliefs, values, and lifeways would cause them to exhibit signs of noncompliance, stress, moral and ethical concerns, and cultural conflicts. The model also has another assumption which states that care is associated with a central, distinct, unifying, and dominant focus and plays a crucial role in the healing and curing processes even though care can be practiced without a cure. Additionally, care is crucial for the growth and survival of human beings as well as their ability to heal, maintain health, and combat death and handicaps.
In my advanced nursing role as a clinical nurse leader, the implications of the theory are pointing to the need to pay attention to the culture of patients both as a leader and nurse. It also implies stressing to other nurses on the importance of culture in the delivery of effective care for individuals with varying backgrounds (Seamon, 2019). As a takeaway from the theory, I would advocate for the cultural-based training of nurses to help them acquire skills for dealing with people from varying backgrounds.
In brief, the cultural care nursing theory was developed out of the need to deliver tailor-made care to patients from various backgrounds. In her theory, Leininger used various assumptions under which it operates. The assumptions place care at the center of nursing and link it with the basic requirement for health, well-being, growth, healing, and the ability to face death. When applied accordingly, the theory provides a framework for the provision of care in a culturally meaningful way.
Reference
Seamon, R. (2019). Addressing Appalachian Health Disparities: Applying Madeleine Leininger’s Culture Care Theory to Health Care in Appalachia.
Wehbe-Alamah, H. B. (2018). Leininger’s culture care diversity and universality theory: Classic and new contributions. Annual Review of Nursing Research, 37(1), 1-23.