Accreditation practice pointer: respectful and culturally appropriate care

Criterion C2.1 – Respectful and culturally appropriate care.

RACGP Standards for general practice.

General practice needs to provide inclusive patient healthcare. This can be demonstrated through the following actions:

  • demonstrate that you have considered and respect patients’ rights, identity, body diversity, beliefs, and religious and cultural backgrounds when providing healthcare.

  • maintain a cultural safety policy for the practice team and patients so that your practice team knows they are required to provide care that is respectful of a person’s culture and beliefs, and that is free from discrimination

  • provide appropriate training and education so that the practice team knows how to help patients feel culturally safe in the service

  • maintain a policy about patients’ rights and responsibilities

  • maintain a policy about the ceasing of a patient’s care

  • maintain policies and processes about patient health records

  • maintain an anti-discrimination policy

  • provide access to cultural awareness and cultural safety training for the practice team and keep records of the training in the practice’s training register

  • maintain a policy of acknowledging, recording and implementing the names and pronouns used by each patient

  • demonstrate that patients’ assigned sex at birth, variations of sex characteristics (intersex status) and gender are recorded separately in your clinical software

  • meet a patient’s request for a practitioner they feel comfortable with, if possible

  • have separate sections of the waiting room for men and women, if possible and culturally appropriate for your patient population

  • hold meetings for the clinical team to discuss and identify the unique health needs of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex and asexual (LGBTQIA+) patients and those of other gender and sexual diversities

  • use a clinical audit tool to identify cultural groups in your population

  • display signs acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land

  • display Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander art and flags

  • display LGBTIQA+ symbols and/or flags

  • display organisational cultural protocols within the office, waiting areas and consultation rooms

  • provide resources appropriate to the health literacy and cultural needs of your patients.

Margot Schoonmaker