Essay Example with Analysis and Evaluation of the Community Agency Observation

The organization where the observation and evaluation took place is called Clara Martin Center, and it specializes in helping patients who are suffering from mental issues. Among the many services the organizations provides include child and family services, school services, adult services, substance abuse as well as emergency services. Clara Martin Center for mental health has been operational for the last 50 years and specializes in providing high-quality community mental health services in Orange County as well as the greater valley geographical area. The name Clara Martin Center was adopted in 1994, and the center was initially called orange county mental health services. The name change was in accordance with the centers aim of honoring the founder of the center who was known as Clara Martin. Clara Martin was also a pioneer in mental health care in Orange County.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

The organization is located in the area of Orange County but provides its services to patients from all over the upper valley region. The accessibility of the center is simple for the residents of Orange County even though those who leave in outer areas need to take public transport in order to be able to access the clinic. This may not be a headache for most people because public transport is easily available to the residents or Orange County and is also cheap and reliable. Clara Martin Center specializes in providing mental health services people of all ethnic groups, gender, age, and race. Most people who use the services include residents of Orange County as well as other people from neighboring areas. Due to the organization's good reputation, the center has been able to attract clients from the greater upper valley region that increasing its sphere of influence. The center is also located in a good neighborhood whereby people from all classes of life can be comfortable visiting. The ethnic composition of the area is also balanced with numerous races such as whites, blacks, Latinos, and Asians. This composition gives the center an advantage whereby people of different backgrounds do not mind visiting the center due to fear of discrimination.

The center also has no history of discrimination by the level of income of the patient in question. This means giving specialized care to the patients who are well off in life and ignoring the patients who are from poor backgrounds. The centers decor is also culturally diverse in the sense the reading materials in the waiting area are not focused on a particular race. The reading materials include culturally diverse readings such as magazines, newspapers, and periodicals. Also in the waiting area are materials detailing how various members of the society can help the center in its quest to cater and help more mental health patients. This is a good move since having reading materials that focused on a certain culture or race could portray the organization in the bad light. The organization analysis also found out that the center is culturally diverse in the sense that members of its staff are different races and cultural backgrounds. The diversity of staff in an organization encompasses race, gender, ethnic group, age, personality, cognitive style, tenure, organizational function, and education. An organization that embraces diversity has a lot of success since it receives clients from all backgrounds, and hence its reputation grows. Clara Martin Center embraces diversity in the employment of its staff members because it realizes that servicing mental patients from various backgrounds needs the center to have a culturally diverse staff member. The staff of Clara Martin Center seems culturally aware and responsive to the needs and wants of the patients, a move that has enabled the organization to have a good reputation in the area.

Clara Martin Center is a multicultural organization, and the evaluation revealed that its mission statements and programs are meant to be in line with its vision of being a culturally diverse organization. The center also reflects a commitment to diversity by how it is focused on employing staff from various cultural backgrounds to cater to the needs of patients who come from various ethnic groups and races as well. Clara Martin Center programs show the commitment that the center is focused in embracing multicultural diversity in the society by being able to serve patients from all over Orange County without discriminating. For example, the weekend crash program offered at the center is normally held at the Hotel Coolidge at 39 main streets. The move is meant to accommodate more people than the center can accommodate. Through the program, the Center encourages any people to register for the program so that they can receive care and also such as move is also meant to encourage people from all cultural backgrounds to attend the center.

The outpatient recovery and after care group is also another program at the center which shows the cultural diversity of the center. The program is meant to enhance the relapse prevention skills and broadens consumers understanding of recovery as a lifestyle change. Consumers are encouraged to adapt the recovery plan to their lifestyle and also the program is mostly meant for substance use abusers who are seeking to recover from the vice. The center makes sure to do follow up checks on all patients despite their cultural backgrounds as it understands the orange county population to be one society made up of some ethnic groups.

Clara Martin center addresses multicultural aspects in a provision of its services directly and indirectly. Cultural considerations are taking an active role in the field of mental health, and this explains the reason why Clara Martin Center makes all the necessary changes to the organization to make sure that it is culturally diverse. The society demands that mental health providers be culturally sensitive as well as competent so as to provide the best care to patients who come from different cultural backgrounds. For example since Clara Martin center works mostly with children and families, the organization must be attuned to cultural issues. Cultural diversity in an organization is important since cultural definitions of "family" or "substance abuse" may vary. Cultural understandings of what constitutes family dynamics and roles vary widely hence highlighting the importance of having a culturally diverse organization that is ready to cater for the needs and wants of members of the society regardless of their cultural backgrounds. Clara Martin center has a number of programs that are meant to address the issue of cultural diversity in the area. Moreover, the organization also addresses the issue of multicultural diversity by having staff members from various cultural backgrounds hence they are able to understand how they can attend to the patients in relation to their cultures. For example in some cultures, battering women are allowed, and men in those cultures may find it hard being told that they are equal to women. For example men in the middles east believe that they are more superior to women hence they can do what they want with them. When such a person attends therapy at the center may find a staff member who believes women battering are a criminal offense hence takes a defensive position against the patient. Such a move can only alienate the patient further. Hence they need someone who understands their culture to advise them on how the marriage can work. This classic example highlights the need for the culturally diverse staff which can understand what a particular culture says about the issue at hand.

Therapists who work with families, children and teenagers must be in a good position to evaluate and address cultural issues in counseling. For example, Indian tribes in the United States dictate that even if a child is removed from the area, they must observe the family traditions at all times and at no time should they bet taught otherwise. This example shows that in order to deal with a patient with an Indian origin, they must be in a position to understand their cultures and beliefs. This makes one understand the importance of having a culturally diverse organization. Staff members are able to handle the patients according to their needs and hence make sure that they are satisfied with the services offered. Cultural awareness of a group of people explains the worldview of such a group, meaning how such individuals see the world from a moral, social, ethical and philosophical perspective. A cultural belief is said to be a person's values, beliefs, and assumptions. This means that cultural views are different hence the belief of one person may be different from a belief of another person. For example, a couple in marriages may cheat but in the American cultural view, such an action is not a crime. Such couples can decide to divorce from their mutual consent or visit a center where they can get counseling on how they can avoid such an action in the future. In the Middle Eastern culture, cheating is a criminal offense and is punishable by death. Such a criminal sentence does not exist in the United States hence, the public cannot be allowed to use. A patient from the Middle East may also not under the essence of divorcing since according to their culture, only death separates a man and his wife and not just their will. This classic example shows how two patients of diverse cultural groups can be attended by a staff member from a single cultural group because they may not know how to address the issue. Clara Martin Center works hard to ensure that the organization remains culturally diverse to cater to the needs of the patients who attend the center.

The staff members of Clara Martin center demonstrated multicultural sensitivity when identifying problems and responding to symptoms and help-seeking behaviors by using the patient-centered health care model. The patient-centered health care model is the best model to address the issue of multicultural diversity in health care organizations because it allows for the personalized health care. Hence they can choose which staff member to work with. Such a choice enables the health care patient to receive quality services by a competent staff member. Culturally sensitive health care is the ability of the organization to be appropriately and effectively responsive to the attitudes, feelings or circumstances of groups of people that share a common and significant rational, linguistic, racial, religious and cultural heritage. Culturally sensitive health has described a type of health care in which the providers give the patients care according to the patients' needs and expectations. The only way such type of care can be given is through the use of patient-centered health care whereby the organization has some staff members of are from different cultural backgrounds and hence they can cater for patients from diverse cultural backgrounds as well. The patient-centered health care model practiced by Clara Martin center has some characteristics that distinguish from the services provided by other health care centers. First, it makes an emphasis on displaying a service provision model that is focused on the needs of the patient and addressing their needs personally. Patients identify patient-centered model as being respectful to their culture and hence most of the times prefer the model as compared to other models. Secondly, the model conceptualizes the patient-provider relationship as a form of partnership not just viewing it as a formal relationship. The partnership is mostly centered on the patient because the health care provider tries to attend to the needs of the patient and not vice versa. Thirdly, the model is patient empo...