Ethical and Cultural Perspectives of Inquiry Paper

 

Compose a focused paper that explains and describes your healthcare issue or topic from a cultural and ethical perspective of inquiry. (You will cover two perspectives in one paper.)

Form and answer two levels of research questions for each inquiry to address your chosen topic.

• Choose a “Level 1 Research Question/Writing Prompt” from both of the lists below to answer in the paper.
• Compose a “Level 2 Research Question/Writing Prompt” for each kind of inquiry that provides detail, specificity, and focus to your inquiry, research, and writing.
• State your research questions in your paper’s introduction.
• Form the body of your paper by answering each research question and support your assertions with evidence (research).
• In the conclusion of the paper, briefly review the issues, research questions, answers, and insights.

Level 1 Research Questions/Writing Prompts
ETHICAL Perspective of Inquiry

• What laws govern or pertain to the issue?
• What ethical obstacles affect how the medical community addresses the issue?
• How do ethical theories apply to the issue?
• How do money, power, and control matters relate to the issue and its treatment?

Level 1 Research Questions/Writing Prompts
CULTURAL Perspective of Inquiry

• Which cultural values and/or norms influence the issue?
• How is the issue addressed differently in varying cultural contexts and situations?
• Which cultures or societies are most affected by the issue? Why?
• Which cultural traditions affect the treatment(s)?

Your paper must be five pages in length and reference four to six scholarly, peer-reviewed resources. Be sure to follow current APA Style (e.g., spacing, font, headers, titles, abstracts, page numbering).

Refer to the rubric for evaluation details and to assist in preparing the paper.

1

7

Searching and Evaluating Ethical and Cultural Resources on Hypertension

Winnie Nyamapfumba

West Coast University

CAPS 401: General Education Capstone

Courtney Sullivan

December 6th , 2020

Introduction

The research paper analyses the ethics and cultural issues relating to hypertension. The analysis is to discuss cultural values and norms influencing and contributing to hypertension. The ethical concerns relate to the laws pertaining to hypertension. The research will also extend to the analysis of the culture or societies that are most affected by hypertension. In that case, it will be appropriate to understand the cultural traditions that affect the treatment of Hypertension. Again, the research analysis is also concerned with how money and power matters affect the treatment of Hypertension.

Research Questions

L1 – What ethical obstacles affect how the medical community addresses

Hypertension?

L2 – In an effort to eliminate obstacles limiting education to Hypertension,

what practises can influence good health and control of future chronic illness like Hypertension?

L1 – How is the issue of Hypertension addressed in a different cultural

context?

L2 – Considering cultural contexts factors like education, lack of insurance

and low income, can these influence adequate measures to control

Hypertension?

What ethical obstacles affect how the medical community addresses Hypertension

The ethics of compliance implies conflict within the definition of compliance regarding hypertension (Beaman, 2011). Again, evidence-based medicine appears to provide clear pathways and approaches to clinical decisions.

However, the patient is never part of the process of decision-making (Hales, 2013). Ethically, it is right for physicians to develop a treatment plan and ensure that the therapy is acceptable to the patient who received the required compliance. Interventions are usually tested to change patient behaviors as far as ethical issues are concerned (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). A few areas must be designed to consider the point of view of the patient. Some ethical issues on treatment suggest that ideal patient can be obedient and passive at the same time (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). Nonetheless, few patients are passive either or obedient. An individual’s perspective and goals most certainly will affect adherence to medical treatment, and that cannot be ignored (Hales, 2013).

Research to inform strategies for management and prevention of hypertension is crucial to the affected and infected person (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). However, most research raises concerns on the complex ethical issues affecting medicines’ supply and the required pragmatic approach (Hales, 2013). For instance, there exist treatment methods that are prohibitively expensive and not widely available. Perhaps, the life-saving medicines should be made freely available to sick people (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). Prevention and treatment care of hypertension might not have reached the current number of affected people worldwide if the initial obstacles surrounding the treatment methods were solved (Beaman, 2011).

Maybe, there is the pressing need to take on board the lessons from the progress made while researching and developing treatment controls on hypertension (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). Nevertheless, some research might result in meaningless results if the process of supplying medicines is erratic (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). Therefore, it is not necessary to purchase drugs for trial participants without further considerations. The best approach is to ensure that the solution involves policymakers, healthcare providers, community representatives, and patient groups (Beaman, 2011).

In other words, a fundamental ethical requirement is all about meaningful engagement with every stakeholder (Hales, 2013).

In an effort to eliminate obstacles limiting education to Hypertension, what practises can influence good health and control of future chronic illness like Hypertension?

Self-management behaviours like taking medications as prescribed, eating a heart-healthy diet, engaging in physical activity, and smoking cessation are some of the crucial norms for people with hypertension (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). The mentioned lifestyle and behavioural changes have proven useful to reduce hypertension’s adverse effects among minority communities (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). For instance, smoking cessation counselling from a recognized clinician, together with pharmaceutical treatment, has effectively treated hypertension among African Americans (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017).

Moreover, individualized behavioural programs have also increased physical activity among the minority group affected by hypertension disease (Hales, 2013). The use of group physical activity interventions might also be more useful for undeserving ethnic and racial minority populations (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). The affected persons should adopt programs like dietary approaches to stop hypertension (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). These methods involve a diet high in vegetables and fruits and low in saturated sodium and fat (Beaman, 2011)s. These diets can improve the hypertension outcomes of the affected persons. Racial disparities are also the main issues affecting the control of hypertension (Beaman, 2011). They are significantly impacted by beliefs and attitudes about health and hence, affecting the engagement in healthy behaviours by the affected persons (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). Beliefs and attitudes shape health behaviours and inform health professionals’ efforts to improve the outcomes of treating hypertension (Hales, 2013).

Additionally, social support is a facilitator of self-management of behaviours of the people affected with hypertension (Hales, 2013). However, women with hypertension usually identify unique barriers to self-management, like difficulty in maintaining healthy diets because of family expectations concerning food preparation practices (Beaman, 2011). Engagement in physical activities serves as a cue-to-action for increasing engagement in better nutrition and physical activity (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). Such engagements help with the development of interventions aimed at improving the self-management behaviors of the patients affected by hypertension.

How is Hypertension addressed differently in varying cultural contexts and situation?

Regarding cultural context, factors such as education, structural assimilation, and modernization are correlated with favourable profiles of Hypertension or Blood Pressure (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). For instance, the prevalence of hypertension among Hispanic Americans increases with the acculturation process, and on the other hand, it is inversely correlated with their socioeconomic status (Beaman, 2011). Furthermore, language proficiency and acculturation in this kind of ethnic group are directly linked with the incidence of diabetes and its associated morbidities (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). The same morbidities have implications for patients with cardiovascular health (Hales, 2013).

Similarly, among Mexican Americans, age, and acculturation are some of the strong predictors of hypertension and not economic status (Hales, 2013). Unfortunately, Mexican American women who are proficient in English and have healthcare coverage are more likely to be screened for heart disease than their counterparts who do not have healthcare coverage nor speak proficient English (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). In that case, the risk of hypertension is highest for US-born English-Speaking individuals and US-born Spanish-speaking individuals. Cardiovascular diseases are established to be the lowest for people who are of Mexican origin (Beaman, 2011).

Additionally, Latina and Hispanic individuals are the biggest minority in the population of the United States at a percentage above 15 (Hales, 2013). These groups exhibit a great degree of physiologic, socioeconomic, and genetic variability when it comes to hypertension (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). Because of such complexity, the intra-cultural variability for the treatment of hypertension deems greater appreciation (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). Research findings also suggest that there are always differences in disease complications and prevalence in a single ethnic group, especially when accessing health care (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). For instance, it can be notable that Dominican Americans have a higher incidence of hypertension when compared to Mexican Americans (Hales, 2013).

Considering cultural contexts factors like education, lack of insurance and low income, can these influence adequate measures to control Hypertension?

Household wealth or money matters can enable or limit the patient’s ability to access healthcare services and adequate measures to control hypertension (Beaman, 2011). Even though rich people are prone to hypertension, they can easily access adequate treatment because of their deep pockets (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). Unfortunately, it is different from the poor, who will struggle to access the required treatment because they lack funds to support their daily life activities (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). Therefore, money and power matters can easily be influenced by how a patient can overcome cardiovascular diseases such as hypertension (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013). Again, it is difficult for people with low-income to attend the required therapy, such as smoking cessation, because they lack funds to support such sessions (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017).

The issue of money and power matters can also be narrowed down to healthcare affordability (DeWit & O’Neill, 2013).

Conclusion

In conclusion, aggressive, innovative, ethical, and timely treatment with support in the community-based context is needed for patients with hypertension. Therefore, the interventions to reduce disparities in the outcomes in cardiovascular should consider the need to intensify drug therapy on the populations that are of high-risk. The aggressiveness of the treatment strategies is key to achieving the maximum control of hypertension among high-risk patients. Even though hypertension continues to be a major health concern to most patients, when they are given access to effective care, they tend to demonstrate high responsiveness. Ideally, the objective is to come up with effective and culturally responsive hypertension management methods, especially for high-risk patients (Bruggman & Ortiz-Hartman, 2017). They also need to achieve positive and observable health outcomes.

References

Bruggman, A., & Ortiz-Hartman, K. (2017). Community & family health issues: An encyclopedia of trends, conditions & treatments. Salem Press.

Beaman, N. (2011). Pearson’s comprehensive medical assisting: Administrative and clinical

competencies. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Pearson.

DeWit, S. C., & O’Neill, P. A. (2013). Fundamental concepts and skills for nursing. Philadelphia, Pa: Saunders.

Hales, D. (2013). An invitation to health: Build your future. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.