Culturally safe and inclusive care is not about knowing everything or getting every interaction right. It’s about staying curious, reflecting and working things out together.
Our recent webinar, What Gets in the Way of Culturally Safe and Inclusive Care, looked at how practitioners can do just that. Facilitated by social worker Mish Kumar-Jonson, the panel explored how bias develops and where it can show up in mental health care.
Missed the discussion? Some of our big takeaways are below. Meanwhile, you can watch the whole webinar from today on the MHPN website.
1. A missed appointment might be a message
General practitioner Dr Joel Wright spoke about how bias can show up in patterns such as someone not attending an appointment, not taking medication or not following through with a referral.
Rather than viewing these behaviours in isolation, he encouraged practitioners to consider what may have happened before. Someone who has had negative experiences with services may arrive more heightened or find it harder to trust the next practitioner they see.
Dr Wright suggested you might tell the patient: “I’m going to listen to you today. We’re going to work together.” Taking the time to build trust and understand the person in front of you can help interrupt that cycle.
2. Good intentions aren’t always enough
Clinical psychologist Dr Averil Cook pointed out that caring values do not automatically mean we have the skills to provide culturally safe care. “The science in which we were all trained actually has its own assumptions and framework and biases embedded within that,” Dr Cook said
Social worker Erin Joyce highlighted that legal frameworks, liability and wider system pressures can influence how clinicians are able to practise. Her approach is to be “tough on systems and gentle on individuals”, recognising that systemic problems can exist even when the people working within those systems care deeply about the people they support.
3. Perfect isn’t the goal. Safe enough is.
Culturally safe practice requires ongoing curiosity, reflection, humility and conversation. Peer worker Amity Mara described bias as a cycle, where individual assumptions shape the systems and practice that then shape the next generation of practitioners. Breaking that cycle is not something one person can do alone.
