Brief
This project was in collaboration with Oslo University Hospital (OUS), OUS Home, and The Regional Section for Psychiatry, Developmental Disabilities and Autism (PUA) as part of the "C3 Health" Program.
They speak of different bubbles within hospitals, e.g., the "patient bubble" and the "hospital bubble." And within these bubbles, we find various kinds of cultures.
To live and receive healthcare in one's own home might benefit the well-being of many patients. For this reason, decentralized healthcare provided in the patient's home increases in Norway.
We decided to explore how one can design for more trust and safety between staff, psychiatric patients, and their next of kin when the patient lives at home and the people involved have diverse cultural backgrounds.
To do that, we had to reflect on how implicit bias might hinder examining someone else's cultural bubble.
We realised that increasing competency about cultures was not the primary goal, but instead to focus and reflect on how one approaches different cultures than one's own.
Health care should not be one-size-fits-all. The Culture Program strives towards Equity, where everyone gets what they need to reach their best selves, rather than Equality, where everyone are given the same no matter their starting point.
The Culture Program
During our research process, we realized that increasing competency about cultures was not the primary goal, but to focus on how we are meeting different cultures than our own. Therefore, the project ended up being The Cultural Program - a set of tools for healthcare workers to reflect on their role and position before, during, and after examinations in patients' homes.
The Culture Program aims to strengthen the trust and safety between staff, psychiatric patients, and their next of kin when living in assisted apartments, where they have different cultural backgrounds.
The service is to be found on OUS’ internal website, and consists of five parts:
The first step, Self Reflection, lets you reflect on your role and personal privileges through reflective and interactive assignments.
The second step- Education: provide you with more theory-based resources related to cultural humility.
These resources could be in the form of a podcast, presentation, questionnaire, or video animations.
These resources could be in the form of a podcast, presentation, questionnaire, or video animations.
In the third step, reflection in context presents you with representative scenarios to make you more aware of your role and privileges also in context.
The fourth step, the sharing part, is about sharing, listening, and discussing experiences in conversations with colleagues.
To lower the threshold when sharing experiences, one could be anonymous.
To lower the threshold when sharing experiences, one could be anonymous.
The last step, The In Practice-part, provides a tangible or digital object or a technique that aims to remind you to focus on the individual you approach and to 'activate' your humility when entering their cultural bubble.
The reminder could be a bracelet, screensaver image, app, or physical exercise. These artifacs aim to remind you to focus on the individual and to ‘activate’ your humility when entering a bubble.
