Nutrition High Risk Nursing Research Assignment Paper

Nutrition High Risk
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Nutrition High Risk
The world keeps on evolving changing several aspects of our lives including food preferences and other nutritional practice. Previously, foods like red meat, milk, and eggs were readily available and could be consumed in large amounts without experiencing any health complication. Today doctors recommend fruits and grains with limited intake of certain foods like meat to minimize the risk of diseases. Many ethnic groups prefer eating their traditional food despite the risk involved. High-risk behavior is common among many ethnic groups who believe that they need to follow their tradition despite evidence proving that certain behaviors put them at higher risk of acquiring lifestyle diseases. For example, smoking is one of the traditional practices among several communities associated with high-risk behaviors (Hamilton, Palermo, & Green, 2015). African American culture promotes certain high-risk behavior owing to their sedentary lifestyle. Such beliefs impact negatively on individual health as they influence nutritional choices putting many individuals at risk. Ethnic communities engage in the unhealthy behaviors despite being aware of some of their negative consequences. African Americans have the highest rates of obesity. Their culture encourages certain lifestyle putting them at risk of developing cardiovascular diseases. Behavior like smoking is one of the acceptable rituals among this group (Hamilton, Palermo & Green, 2015). The government has initiated health care intervention to promote a healthy lifestyle. However, most ethnic prefer maintaining most of their cultural practices. That is the reason it is important to analyze some of the nutritional or health-related behavior that put various ethnic groups at risk
The High Risk-Nutritional Behaviors Practiced Among Ten Different Cultures
Various ethnic groups engage in the unhealthy behavior despite being aware of the health risks, for example, Mexican culture promotes high-risk behaviors like drinking. According to Mexican culture, drinking is a social act that takes place in social gatherings. Mexican culture promotes togetherness by organizing social events where alcohol is served. Drinking presents several health issues among this population (Curran & Saggy, 2013). The same applies to Germans, German are known for consuming alcohol with several restaurants serving spirits. In German, beer is a way of life, and young children can drink beer as early as 16 years. Several other cultures believe that celebrations with alcohol are acceptable the same applies to smoking (Curran & Saggy, 2013).
According to Rogers et al. (2015), in many societies, alcohol forms part of their tradition more so in countries like Italy, France, and Spain. The southern Europe culture promotes drinking with open drinking spaces being allocated for drinking and alcohol displayed everywhere. Drinking spaces extend to another environment like homes hence promote high consumption of alcohol (Rogers et al., 2015).
Among the Hispanic, the process of acculturation is closely associated with negative health-related behavior. Acculturation is the process where people from other cultures relinquish their traditional norms to adopt new ones. Immigrants, mostly from Hispanic backgrounds, are affected negatively by the acculturation process. For example, smoking is frequent among Hispanic communities living in the US. Hispanic women smoke cigarettes, they are overweight and not physically active (O'Connor et al., 2014).
Immigration has greatly influenced behavior among several ethnic minorities in the US. Environment and social factors have influenced dietary intake especially for immigrant living along the south coast in the US. Immigrants living who lived in Caribbean Islands are known for their high assumption of seafood and spicy foods readily available throughout the year. Caribbean immigrants who move to bigger cities in the US are forced to assimilate with the American tradition of fast food, which is unhealthy. Most of these immigrants struggle to cope with the fast life and resort to heavy drinking (O'Connor et al., 2014).
African Americans are known to have the highest rates of heart diseases due to their lifestyle. Obesity is the leading cause among this population because according to African American beliefs, being overweight is a sign of wealth. Smoking tobacco is a highly acceptable tradition among African American; this practice is dominant especially among teenagers (Kumanyika et al., 2014). Some of their traditional cultural beliefs related to medicine affect health care efforts to control unhealthy behavior practices. African Americans believe in traditional herbs to cure common diseases but are ignorant of their side effects. They prefer using traditional treatment methods and can only visit a hospital as the last option (Kumanyika et al., 2014).
Among the Polish population, cultural and environmental factors influence their food choices. Traditional events like name days and weddings are some of their traditional norms. People are named during specific days; polish celebrates such events. Celebrations are not complete without poultry, cake, bread, cookies. Weddings are common among these (O'Connor et al., 2014). On the wedding day, the bride and the groom traditionally are greeted with bread and salt after the church ceremony. Alcohol is acceptable and readily available even to children during weddings Christmas season is traditional among Polish, baking cookies, honey spiced cakes, and other foods are common. Such practices have promoted health risk nutritional related behaviors (O'Connor et al., 2014).
Cubans are known to maintain family and traditional, in Cuba ice cream is a special treat and has become a national obsession. Coppelia is a renowned ice cream manufactured in Cuba, and it is believed to be the best. Cubans have other traditional practices; food is the most important feature among Cuban traditional. Food preparation is a traditional p...