Cultural Competence in Health Care

Cultural competence in Health Care provides a balance between a theoretical foundation and clinical application. Because of the focus on basic principles, this book will be useful not only in the United States, but throughout the world as Cultural Competence is intending to fill the cultural competence gap for students and practitioners of medicine and related health sciences, by providing knowledge and describing the skills needed for culturally relevant medical care of patients of diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds.

Wen-Shing Tseng, MD, is a professor of psychiatry at the University of Hawaii School of Medicine. He was born in Taiwan in 1935 and was trained in psychiatry at the National Taiwan University of Taipei and later at the Massachusetts Mental Health Center of Harvard Medical School in Boston. He was a research fellow in culture and mental health at the East-West Center from 1970-1971, before he was recruited as a faculty member of the University of Hawaii School of Medicine, where he became a professor in 1976 and has served as training director for the psychiatric residency training program between 1975-1982. Dr. Tseng is a consultant to the World Health Organization and served as chairman of the Transcultural Psychiatry Section of the World Psychiatric Association for two terms from 1983-1993. He has edited, co-edited and authored over a dozen books dealing with psychiatry, psychotherapy, and cultural psychiatry.

Jon Streltzer, MD, is a professor of psychiatry at the University of Hawaii School of Medicine where he was a training director from 1982-1996. He is a graduate of the University of Colorado School of Medicine and is board certified in general psychiatry, addiction psychiatry, and pain management. He has been Chair of the Chronic Pain Task Force of the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry, and is a member of the Pain Medicine Board Examination Committee of the American Board of Anesthesiologists. He has been on the editorial board of the International Journal of Psychiatry and Medicine and is a reviewer for several journals. Dr. Streltzer is widely published in the areas of psychosomatic medicine, pain, and cultural psychiatry.