Cultural Competence

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The resources provided on this page may help programs and agencies to successfully navigate their journey of establishing and infusing linguistic and cultural competence.

National

• Bronx Health Resources for Elderly Assistance and Community Help (REACH) is working to challenge health disparity by changing the systems, processes and environment that promote it. This includes working with faith-based organizations and businesses, the health system and policy-makers.
• Culture Clues
  (African American, Albanian, American Indian/Alaska Native, Chinese, Deaf & Hard - of - Hearing, Korean, Latino, Russian, Somali and Vietnamese) End of life Care: The Latino Culture; The Russian Culture; The Vietnamese Culture
• Ethnomed site contains information about cultural beliefs, medical issues and related issues pertinent to the health care of recent immigrant to the Unified States (US), many of whom are refugees fleeing war-torn parts of the world.
• Georgetown University Child and Adolescent National Center for Cultural Competence
  The Center provides national leadership and contributes to the body of knowledge on cultural and linguistic competency within systems and organizations. It emphasizes translating evidence into policy and practice for programs and personnel concerned with health and mental health care delivery, administration, education and advocacy.
• Mental Health: Culture, Race and Ethnicity
  This 2001 supplement to the Surgeon General's Report provides a framework for better understanding scientific evidence and its implications for eliminating disparities and reinforces how stigma and shame deter many Americans, including racial and ethnic minorities, from seeking treatment.
• National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI)
  National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) created the Multicultural Action Center in 2002 to focus attention on system reform to eliminate disparities in mental health care for diverse communities, ensure access to culturally competent services and treatment for all Americans, and particularly to help and support people of diverse backgrounds who are affected by serious mental illness.
• National Center for Cultural Competence
  The mission of the National Center for Cultural Competence is to increase the capacity of health care and mental health care programs to design, implement, and evaluate culturally and linguistically competent service delivery systems to address growing diversity, persistent disparities, and to promote health and mental health equity.
• National Standards on Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS)
  The CLAS standards, which are directed at health care organizations primarily, may also be used to providers to make their practices more culturally and linguistically accessible.
• Quality Health Care for Hispanics: The Culturally Competence Component
  This publication distills information health care providers may need to assure delivery of the best possible care to Hispanic clients in a variety of clinical, prevention, and social service settings. The publication was developed by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) in collaboration with the Substance Abuse and Services Administration, the Office of Minority Health, and National Alliance for Hispanic Health.
• Surgeon General's Report for Cultural Specific Mental Health Resources
  According to the 1999 Surgeon General's Report, "Even more than other areas of health and medicine, the mental health field is plagued by disparities in the availability of and access to its services. Those disparities are viewed readily through the lenses of racial and cultural diversity, age, and gender."
• The Rehabilitation Provider's guide to Cultures of Foreign-Born;
  China, Cuba, Culture brokering, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haitian, India, Jamaica, Korea, Mexico, Phillippines and Vietnam:

State

• A Proud Heritage: Native American Services in New York State
  This publication of the Office of Children and Family Services offers a historical overview of New York State's Native Americans, details current state services and provides valuable references.
• Cultural Profiles
  A series of cultural profiles reviewing the existing professional literature and government reports on cultural groups in New York State are presented here. These profiles highlight cultural traits that need to be taken into account in order to provide meaningful mental health services that meet the needs of the concerned populations and guide service adaptations.
• Empire State Pride Agenda
  The Empire State Pride Agenda is New York's statewide lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) civil rights and advocacy organization. Our mission is to win equality and justice for LGBT New Yorkers and our families. We recognize that while significant cultural, legal and governmental advances have led to greater equality for LGBT New Yorkers, we and our families remain highly vulnerable without the vast majority of rights and protections that most New Yorkers take for granted.
• Families Together in New York State
  Families Together is a non-profit, family-run organization that strives to establish a unified voice for children and youth with emotional, behavioral and social challenges. Our mission is to ensure that every family has access to needed information, support, and services.
• In Our Own Voices, Inc. (IOOV)
  Our mission is to work for and ensure the physical, mental, spiritual, political, cultural and economic survival and growth of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people of color communities.
• National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) New York State
  NAMI-NYS is the state organization of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, the nation's largest grassroots organization for people with mental illness and their families. Founded in 1979, NAMI has affiliates in every state and in more than 1,100 local communities across the country. NAMI-NYS provides support to family and friends of individuals with mental illness and persons living with mental illnesses through more than 50 affiliates statewide.
• New York Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services (NYAPRS)
  The NYAPRS Cultural Competence Committee is a statewide coalition of New Yorkers who use and or provide recovery-centered, community-based, publicly funded mental health services dedicated to promoting the integrated delivery of cultural competence mental health services throughout New York State.
• New York State Office of Minority of Health
  Established by legislation in 1992, the Office of Minority Health is the Department of Health center for issues relating to the health of racial and ethnic minorities.
• Parents with Psychiatric Disabilities Legal Advocacy
  The Parents with Psychiatric Disabilities Legal Advocacy (PPDLA) Project advocates for parents facing challenges to their parental rights due to psychiatric disability. This statewide project is funded through the New York State Commission on Quality of Care and Advocacy for Persons with Disabilities (CQCAPD). Legal Service of Central New York (LSCNY) is responsible for serving the 54 Upstate New York counties outside of New York City, Long Island, and Westchester County.

Other

• Toolkit for Modifying Evidence Based Practices to Increase Cultural Competence
  The Toolkit for Modifying Evidence-Based Practices to Increase Cultural Competence provides a step-by-step methodology for mental health practitioners and agency administrators to identify and evaluate evidence-based practices (EBPs) for possible modification for cultural groups: (From the Center of Excellence in Culturally Competent Mental Health at the Nathan S. Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research).
• Mental Health America
• Bazelon Center
  The Bazelon Center is an advocacy group with a history of influence and success in defending the rights of people with psychiatric disabilities.
• Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, The Office of Multicultural Affairs
  The Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA) functions to enhance the delivery of Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (DMHAS) services for mental health and substance use disorders in a way that acknowledges the impact of individual differences on client treatment, differences such as race, ethnic or cultural background, age, gender, sexual orientation, and physical or mental status.
• Massachusetts Department of Mental Health Cultural Competence Action Plan
  The purpose of the Cultural & Linguistic Competence Action Plan (CCAP) is to operationalize the Department's mission on culturally competent care to ensure that the mental health system is attentive to the needs and effective care of culturally and linguistically diverse populations, including at-risk immigrants and refugees.
• Nathan S. Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research
• New York State Psychiatric Institute
• National Center for Cultural Competence
• National Standards on Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS)
• Office of Minority Health
  
• Cultural Competence
• Culture Clues
  (African American, Albanian, American Indian/Alaska Native, Chinese, Deaf & Hard - of - Hearing, Korean, Latino, Russian, Somali and Vietnamese) End of life Care: The Latino Culture; The Russian Culture; The Vietnamese Culture
• Ethnomed site contains information about cultural beliefs, medical issues and related issues pertinent to the health care of recent immigrant to the US, many of whom are refugees fleeing war-torn parts of the world.
• The Rehabilitation Provider's guide to Cultures of Foreign-Born:
  China, Cuba, Culture brokering, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Haitian, India, Jamaica, Korea, Mexico, Phillippines and Vietnam

Comments or questions about the information on this page can be directed to the Bureau of Cultural Competence.