This project was started by WREP, the Warwickshire Race Equality Partnership, which evolved into EQuIP in 2017.
During the last 3 years, the Healthy Diversity Partnership has investigated various aspects of diversity and intercultural actions in the healthcare sector in the UK, Austria, Denmark, France, Hungary and Italy.
The project activities started with workshops and interviews with healthcare professionals and patients, aimed at collecting individual stories of critical situations arising from interactions with people from a different cultural background.
The stories were then analysed through the Culture Shocks methodology developed by the French social psychologist Margalit Cohen-Emerique and the final selection of 60 'Critical Incidents' was categorised and organised in the Manual of Critical Incidents.
Our journey continued with the research and selection of medical anthropology studies based on multidisciplinary approaches to health and wellbeing. The Medical Anthropology Reader consists of a literature review of 12 articles combining medicine, psychology, sociology, anthropology as well as cultural and migration studies. An interesting read for non experts!
Moving to the analysis of the state of the art practices in health and diversity, we have also developed a Good Practice Collection - a guide to 20 Good Practices from various types of healthcare institutions from across Europe and an Assessment Tool for implementation and self-assessment of projects and new efforts aimed at the improvement of diversity management and intercultural competences in the healthcare sector.
The final part of the project has been dedicated to the development of practical training resources for healthcare professionals. This has resulted in a face-to-face training programme and an online course whose main objectives are to:
- increase the understanding about internal, contextual and cultural factors affecting individual behaviours and social interactions
- raise awareness about socio-cultural diversity and its relevance for medical and social care practice
- promote intersectional thinking between different health and social care settings.
Besides the project results, the Health Diversity project has also allowed 16 healthcare and training professionals from the partner countries to take part in international mobilities and training.
The first mobility took place in Palermo, Italy last summer to test the developed training activities, whereas the second group had the chance to participate in the project's final International interdisciplinary conference on health and diversity with keynote speakers and rountables (2-3 Jul 2018)in Budpest, Hungary followed by 3 days of training.
To conclude we are launching an online course and support materials to offer you the chance to step out of your comfort zone and start questioning yourself about your cultural identity and the approach to diversity in your daily work. Stop being politically correct with yourself, discover your sensitive zones and develop strategies for more concsious and effective intercultural interactions!
Further details are on the Healthy Diversity website
