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Communication and Cultural Issues in Providing Reproductive Health Care to Immigrant Women: Health Care Providers’ Experiences in Meeting Somali Women Living in Finland

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An Erratum to this article was published on 04 June 2011

Abstract

Communication problems due to language and cultural differences between health care professionals and patients are widely recognized. Finns are described as more silent whereas one concurrent large immigrant group, the Somalis, are described as more open in their communication. The aim of the study was to explore physicians-nurses/midwives’ communication when providing reproductive and maternity health care to Somali women in Finland. Four individual and three focus group interviews were carried out with 10 gynecologists/obstetricians and 15 nurses/midwives from five selected clinics. The health care providers considered communication (including linguistic difficulties), cultural traditions, and religious beliefs to be problems when working with Somali women. Male and female physicians were generally more similar in communication style, interpersonal contacts, and cultural awareness than the nurses/midwives who were engaged in more partnership-building with the Somali women in the clinics. Despite the communication and cultural problems, there was a tentative mutual understanding between the Finnish reproductive health care professionals and the Somali women in the clinics.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Public Health, University of Turku, 20014, Turku, Finland

    Filio Degni & Sakari Suominen

  2. Department of Women’s and Children’s health, International Maternal and Child Health, University Uppsala, Uppsala, Sweden

    Birgitta Essén

  3. Faculty of Sport, Health and Social Care, University of Gloucestershire, Oxstalls Campus, Oxstalls Lane, Gloucester, GL2 9HW, UK

    Walid El Ansari

  4. Department of Nursing Sciences, University of Kuopio, Kuopio, Finland

    Katri Vehviläinen-Julkunen

Authors
  1. Filio Degni
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  2. Sakari Suominen
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  3. Birgitta Essén
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  4. Walid El Ansari
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  5. Katri Vehviläinen-Julkunen
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Correspondence to Filio Degni.

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An erratum to this article can be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10903-011-9486-1.

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Degni, F., Suominen, S., Essén, B. et al. Communication and Cultural Issues in Providing Reproductive Health Care to Immigrant Women: Health Care Providers’ Experiences in Meeting Somali Women Living in Finland. J Immigrant Minority Health 14, 330–343 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10903-011-9465-6

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