Glossary - "Cultural Competence"

"The level of knowledge-based skills required to provide effective clinical care to patients from a particular ethnic or racial group." (Bureau of Health Professions, Health Resources and Services Administration retrieved 12/26/04 from http://bhpr.hrsa.gov/diversity/cultcomp.htm)

Cultural competence can be seen as a continuum ranging from cultural destructiveness to advanced cultural competence and a process, rather than an event (Campinha-Bacote, 2002).