Dental Hygienist: A Cross-Cultural Communication Analysis

In the healthcare industry, it is of primary important to develop an effective form of communication between providers and clients, or patients, in order to deliver a high quality and cost-effective healthcare service. In this paper, I described my personal experience as a dental hygienist, which was regarding my interaction with a patient who is socially and culturally diverse from me as well as the approach that I used in the cross-cultural communication.
Few years back, a Muslim Asian woman, aged around 50 years old, came to the clinic where I worked at to get a consultation on her dental problems. Based on her personal records and interview data, it was known that she came from a middle-income group, and probably had a moderate level of literacy as observed from her educational background. Since she was not a native English speaker, I could see that language was quite a barrier to our communication. There were some moments which I found it difficult to understand her while she was struggling to explain her medical condition to me. As a Hispanic-descent
This is because information and communication technology (ICT) is the key to global understanding that can promotes a mutual interaction between health care providers and patients, regardless of their socioeconomic status, education or literacy level, and cultural background. As highlighted in EuroHealthNet’s report (Christmann, 2005), the abundance of technological tools can minimize the digital divide and promote interactive health literacy among vulnerable groups in the community, including those who have low language literacy skills. In the context of dentistry, health literacy is a primary determinant of oral health and the use of ICT tools such as web-based applications and software can contribute towards developing a sustainable oral healthcare awareness within the