Creating ties of affection and maintaining the language: Elements of culturally competent care for indigenous people

Abstract

Objective: to interpret the perception of public health nurses when they provide the Embera Chami Indians with culturally competent care. Materials and Method: interpretative ethnography with participant observation and ethnographic interviews. The participants were three public health nurses who work in an intercultural Institution providing health services. The analysis followed Leininger’s proposal with support from Atlas ti and Excel. Results: the category “happy nurses with their work, extending this feeling to the personal field by creating bonds of affection with the indigenous Embera Chami” emerged and it was sustained with three subcategories. Conclusion: the public health nurses enjoy the work activities specified by the intercultural Institutions providing health services, they also enjoy the daily life offered by the work environment and the municipal situation characterized by the presence, socialization and interrelation with the Embera Chami indigenous people.