Culturally Competent Care

At UPMC, our commitment to culturally competent care is built on the foundation of Dignity & Respect. This commitment means that we believe all patients, customers and members have access to quality, culturally appropriate health care, and information to encourage healthy lifestyles. It also means that we equip our workforce with the tools and resources needed to increase cultural awareness and competence, to ensure the best practices in patient care delivery.

We continually prepare our workforce to inclusively address the diverse needs of our patients, families, and communities. We are committed to delivering a quality, culturally appropriate health care experience. Being culturally aware enhances our patient, customer, and workplace experience. This allows everyone to feel valued and respected, considers the perspectives of others, and reminds us to treat others the way they want to be treated.

Our Cultural Awareness Initiative provides tools and resources that enable our employees to deliver treatment and services that value dignity and respect. The tools and resources respond to the health, beliefs, practices, and the cultural and linguistic needs of our diverse patients, employees, and health plan members in the communities we serve. This initiative ensures our ability to provide health care for all communities, including people of color, refugees, immigrants, the LGBTQ community, and people with disabilities (in partnership with the Disabilities Resource Center).

At UPMC, we recognize the differences that make our patients unique and offer a variety of resources to enhance the patient experience and support these valuable differences. Our ongoing commitment to culturally competent care means that we work with internal and external partners to provide support and resources to meet the needs of our patients and customers.

The care and comfort of our patients and their families is important. They provide a variety of services including language interpreters and assistance with special accommodations for patients and their family members during their visit or stay at UPMC facilities.

All of us at UPMC Patient Relations want you to feel comfortable and confident in the care you receive at our hospitals.

Supported by the Wolff Center at UPMC and the Health Services Division’s Call Center, the hotline enables UPMC hospital employees to call one number for support and services to meet the cultural needs of patients. It ensures a more consistent and effective patient experience offering access to interpreter and translation services, and other services needed for quality patient care.

UPMC’s online patient portal – offers a secure and convenient way to access your health information online. View lab results, renew prescriptions, message your doctors’ office and more, all for free.

CultureVision™ is a web-based tool that discusses the needs of various cultures in the health care setting. Available to employees, and embedded in patient systems, Cerner’s PowerChart® provides just-in-time access to help employees better understand the diverse needs of patients and their families, health plan members, and colleagues.

At UPMC, we recognize the unique healthcare needs of individuals in the LGBTQ community and work to create an environment that is welcoming, caring and adaptive to those needs. This means ensuring our employees are equipped with the knowledge, skills and best practices in patient care delivery for individuals in the LGBTQ community. We provide learning, as well as internal and external resources for our employees and patients, to ensure a strong network of ongoing support for those in the LGBTQ community.

Celebrating its 10th year, the Healthcare Equality Index (HEI) is the national LGBTQ benchmarking tool that evaluates healthcare facilities’ policies and practices related to the equity and inclusion of their LGBTQ patients, visitors and employees.

UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh and Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic of UPMC were honored HEI 2017 Leaders in LGBTQ Healthcare Equity.

Learn more about the Healthcare Equality Index

The PERSAD Center

The PERSAD Center is a human service organization whose mission is to improve the well-being of the LGBTQ (lesbian, gay bisexual, transgender, queer and questioning) communities, and the HIV/AIDS communities. We serve our target populations and their loved ones, cradle to grave, across western Pennsylvania, with service centers in Pittsburgh and Washington, PA.

Individual UPMC hospitals and facilities also offer local support and resources for patients.

In 2007, we created the UPMC Disabilities Resource Center with the goal of improving access to health care for our patients with disabilities. The Center’s staff provides education and training, conducts reviews and assessments of our hospitals and facilities, and reviews policies and practices on accessible health care for people with disabilities. A critical element of our work is to engage with the disability community. An Advisory Council guides our disability efforts and helps set our priorities.

People with disabilities who receive care at UPMC have access to a number of disability departments to assist in meeting their needs.

The Center for Women with Disabilities at UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital has been delivering state-of-the-art preventive health care to women with disabilities since 2001.

One of the first such services in the country, the center was designed in consultation with women with disabilities to meet their needs for accessible, regular exams and screenings.

The focus of this partnership is to proactively engage community members, health and human services providers, and UPMC staff to identify services and programs that best address the diverse needs of communities in the UPMC footprint. This partnership also helps to ensure patients' voices are heard. Among the partnership's goals are:

To increase organizational understanding of national best practices in cultural competency, and to meet the needs of the populations we serve.
To engage other agencies, organizations, and communities in our region in supporting our efforts to provide equal health care access for all.
To focus on LGBTQ, and interfaith communities, and newcomers to the U.S. Healthcare system.

The pocket guide provides a brief overview of religious backgrounds and related information, to assist in better understanding and meeting those needs. The guide does not offer theological explanations but basic information about the beliefs and practices of a variety of faith traditions.

Download the Interfaith Pocket Guide (PDF)