%0 Journal Article %A Zaraa, Adel %T Providing mental health services in a multi-cultural emergency setting: Challenges and opportunities %D 2016 %J Journal of Emergency Medicine, Trauma and Acute Care, %V 2016 %N 2 - International Conference in Emergency Medicine and Public Health-Qatar Proceedings %@ 1999-7094 %C 1 %R https://doi.org/10.5339/jemtac.2016.icepq.1 %I Hamad bin Khalifa University Press (HBKU Press), %X Developing cultural competency in mental health provision became an imperative skill in the age of globalization. This involves the enhanced knowledge and attitudes of care givers (NKI). We will review the geodemographic, religious, linguistic, and family structure in the Middle East so we can understand some of the special approaches needed to achieve our goal. We evaluate the common pitfalls and caveats of our own practices starting with our formal western curriculum, the types of therapeutic approaches that we have gathered and learned, our biases and prejudices and all our educational, cultural, and life experience baggage. Also, we will go over the difficulty of applying diagnostic criteria applicable in the west to Middle Eastern pathologies, where albeit they carry the same name, the presentations are very different. A literature review of many documented experiences and research into the same issue was conducted, and we are including the most relevant findings and solutions to approach these practices. Many earnest efforts have been invested in building educational edifices and branches of international colleges in the Middle East that produce highly-educated and skillful professionals, yet the problem is the same for the curriculum that was given, as it was still a western plan tailored to a different society and culture. Conclusion: Although it is a slow process, we have been able to identify some of the differences and as we go, we are applying the appropriate changes (Ex. Validated diagnostic scales, modified interviewing questions and better understanding the cultural idioms of complaints). %U https://www.qscience.com/content/journals/10.5339/jemtac.2016.icepq.1