Rick Haverkate, Director of Public Health for the Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan, gave an excellent presentation on Health Care beliefs and practices among Native American Patients at the Diabetes Partners in Action Coalition.  My favorite part of the presentation was when he said that we are all concerned about cultural competency, however we can never be fully culturally competent.  We can learn about other cultures, but will never be fully competent to provide services for everyone.  What we should be striving for is “human competency” where we acknowledge the humanity within each other and do the best we can to understand our fundamental similarities in addition to our cultural differences.  So, that’s my new favorite vocabulary word.