HLTH 420 Cultural Interview

1. What is your home of origin?

Italy

2. What are some of your family customs and roles of members within your family?
The man is the head of the house
Management for a family should be that God commands the man of the house,
and man directs his family based on this(leadership).
His family liked quality time via movies, dinner.

3. What beliefs, values, and practices surround life events? (E.g. birth, aging death)
Examples- Weddings for Italians. They are different, town/city announcement.
Anyone can show up. Weddings can last 1-3 days.

4. What is your concept of health? What are customary health practices and beliefs?
There is not much driving to work. People walk or ride a bike. Examples are that
there is no high fructose corn syrup. There is real sugar for everything, no
preservatives, and fresh food. A healthy diet is much more simple to achieve
there.
They don’t work full days like in the US. People typically smoke. Breakfast is
coffee and brioche. 7-12:30, then 2:30-5 is the work day. “Riposso” 12:30-2:30 is
a break where they get food to cook for the evening and nap. Lunch is coffee
and biscuit, with a nap. Then cook massive meal after 7:30. They usually stay up
later

5. What beliefs impact the kind of health care you like to receive? Who you see for health
care? When you seek health care?
Health is whollistic, more than America. He grew up in American health because
he was a military child. Only went to Dr for sports physical at military hospital.
Went to Italian ER sometimes. Socialized medicine doesn’t work according to
him. Which is what Italy has. Ceilings in his local ER were filled with black mold.
One of his friends fell and their collarbone broke, and poked through the skin.
They told him to come back in two weeks. They then immediately treated him
once they found out he had insurance. American health system works because
they prioritized.
6. Are there certain cultural courtesies that should be followed by medical personnel when
they see or speak to you or someone in your culture?
Customs are similar to America. He was not as familiar due to going to American
style health care for the military.

7. What behaviors by medical personnel would you find offensive or rude?

He reports that Italian people in general have a more “rude” or “blunt” attitude
than Americans. This could be taken as offensive.

8. What needs to be practiced for effective communication in your culture? Consider the
tone of voice, gestures, eye-contact, or touch. Anything else?
Friends were more like family. Interactions were more personal. People stay
longer when visiting other’s houses. A lot of alcohol and sharing from a bottle is
more common because of the comfort of close friends. Screaming at you
doesn’t mean that they are mad. People are more passionate.

9. Are there any customs, beliefs, or practices that you follow that are or might be
misinterpreted by others in your community, especially health care providers?
Alcohol use. Americans may think he likes to get “hammered”. Passing wine
bottle around at a get together is common. People aren’t alcoholics even though
health care providers in America may think so. People drink slowly because
evenings are slow and long.