Culturally-Conscious Care

This workshops aims to provide an introduction to culturally-conscious care. A focus of this workshop will be on orienting attendees to understanding ways in which we, as mental health care providers, can and ought to approach clinical care in a manner that “… incorporates a lifelong commitment to self-evaluation and critique, to redressing the power imbalances in the [provider]-patient dynamic, and to developing mutually beneficial and non-paternalistic partnerships with communities on behalf of individuals and defined populations” (Tervalon & Murray-García, 1998, p. 123). In this workshop, we will consider ways we can increase our attention, sensitivity, and responsivity to contextual and cultural experiences within the clinical encounter with the goal of enhancing treatment gains, engagement, and retention. We will identify routine challenges in providing culturally-conscious care and explore creative solutions.