Multicultural Care in European Intensive Care Units

Multicultural Care in European Intensive Care Units
Project number: 2016-1-PL01-KA202-026615
Implementation period: 01.10.2016 – 30.09.2018

The role of nurses working in an intercultural environments, especially those that work in Intensive Care Units, seems to be very sensitive. As they often work with unconscious patients, whose family might not be in reach, they are expected to know how to care for a patient depending on culture and religion.

For example, Semites do not permit to touch their body by a third party. Jehovah’s Witness reject any available blood therapies or any derivatives of it. There might be also certain expectations concerning organ transplantation, dealing with the body post mortem. Lack of understanding leads to frustration, anxiety and aggression. Lack of cultural awareness may be a danger to patient’s dignity. Due to this, it was important to equip medical personnel with proper competencies.

As an answer to the above needs, the project aimed at improving the knowledge, skills and competencies of the ICU nurses when caring for a culturally dissimilar patient. This aim was achieved through:

• in-depth analysis of intercultural training needs and intercultural competencies of ICU Nurses
• development of specialist and accredited multicultural course for ICU Nurses
• preparing recommendations for medical documentation to be used by ICU Nurses
• wide dissemination of the outputs across whole Europe.

The project involved directly 520 ICU Nurses. 400 of them took part in the intercultural training needs and competencies analysis, and 120 tested the e-learning course designed especially for them. Other ICU Nurses and Experts from different medical areas participated in working groups organised in each country in order to consult the developed material.

Project website: mice-icu.eu

Polish Association of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care Nurses – Rzeszów, Poland
Danmar Computers – Rzeszów, Poland
Visoka zdravstvena šola v Celju – Celje, Slovenia
OSTRAVSKA UNIVERZITA V OSTRAVE– Ostrava, Czech Republic
EfCCNa – Amsterdam, Netherlands
assist GmbH – Paderborn, Germany

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.