General Guidelines For The Design Of An Intercultural Health Care Model For Yucatecan Mayan Immigrants In San Francisco, California

Abstract

We present the results of the first phase of an applied research project entitled “Connecting Worlds,” which aims to increase access of Yucatecan Mayan immigrants residing in San Francisco, California, to health services and to improve the quality of these services through the design and implementation of a health care model that promotes intercultural understanding between patients and professionals, reducing thus discriminatory experiences. For the first phase of the project we conducted fieldwork in Oxkutzcab, Yucatan, the migrants’ place of origin, to obtain information for developing such a model. From the analysis of this information and three theoretical concepts of multiculturalism, we elucidate the general guidelines for intercultural health care, from a platform of respect and openess to different cultural practices without assuming a priori that. Western medical knowledge is better