Refugee Health Training
CIRH’s refugee health experts train a host of federal, state, and local health jurisdictions; resettlement agencies; physicians; healthcare providers; and school districts on culturally and linguistically appropriate services for refugees. Our trainings improve providers' knowledge, understanding, and skills in working with and providing services to refugees.
Training Highlight: With support from PHI’s Developmental Award and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration (SAMHSA)–funded Lotus Project, CIRH imparted technical expertise to service providers working with Afghan refugee children, including:
Delivering cultural competency and implicit bias-reduction training to increase awareness and acknowledgment of differences in language, culture, socioeconomic status, political and religious beliefs, identity, and life experience.
Aiding resettlement agencies, school districts, and County and State officials in the design and implementation of high-impact health interventions.
Educating clinicians and service providers on the prevention of the overmedicalization of migratory grief—a normal human reaction to adversity and adjustment.
Introducing clinicians and service providers to culturally specific idioms of distress so that illnesses are diagnosed, not overlooked; for example, Afghan refugees tend to show strength by understating their pain and discomfort. Such insights are essential to making accurate diagnoses and improving patient-provider communication:
Although extensively studied and widely used, Evidence-Based Practices (EBP), may not apply to Afghan refugees due to cultural differences. Therefore, we help clinicians introduce and tailor culturally congruent interventions that achieve maximum results while avoiding costly or unnecessary procedures.
Provider awareness of the background, context, and prevalence of illnesses among Afghan refugees—alongside the socioeconomic, cultural, and systemic risk or protective factors that may lead to medical conditions—increases effective treatment.
Lotus Project conducted its first workshop focused on trauma among Afghan refugee children in November 2022 in Sacramento, California. Workshop details can be found here.