On December 10, GNYHA hosted a member briefing to discuss upcoming developments in cultural competency. Two national organizations, The Joint Commission and the National Quality Forum (NQF), separately are developing new criteria for addressing cultural competency in health care. The Joint Commission has begun an 18-month project to create new hospital accreditation standards or amend existing standards to specifically address cultural competency. The Joint Commission has partnered with the National Health Law Program to develop the implementation guide by January 2010 with the intention of making the new standards part of the accreditation process in January 2011. Separately, NQF since 2007 has been developing a comprehensive national framework for evaluating cultural competency across health care settings. Voting members of NQF have until December 22, 2008, to vote for the endorsement of some or all of the 45 proposed cultural competency practices. 
     
GNYHA was also pleased to have speakers from three member institutions describing their innovative efforts to address cultural competency with limited resources. Virginia Tong, MSW, from Lutheran Medical Center, described her hospital’s efforts to address cultural competency through a combination of grant-seeking activity and partnerships with community-based organizations.  Jeffery Bentley, from Coler-Goldwater Specialty Hospital and Nursing Home, discussed the cultural competency assessment tool his institution developed as well as plans to incorporate the tool into annual performance reviews to ensure that staff continuously focus attention on cultural competency. Lastly, Thanakorn Jirasevijinda, MD, FAAP, from Weill Cornell Medical College and Bronx Lebanon Hospital Center, spoke on the importance of training medical residents in cultural competency. He also described a cultural competency assessment tool that was designed and is currently being piloted in cooperation with the GNYHA Foundation. This tool was specifically designed to gauge cultural competency among medical residents and to facilitate continuous improvement of cultural competency training in medical residency programs. For more information on health care cultural competency, visit the Health Disparities Resource Center at www.gnyha.org.