Multicultural genetic counseling: Then, now, and in the 21st century

Scholars, educators, and practitioners have argued that racial-cultural iss ues are obstacles for those seeking genetic counseling. When available, cro ss-cultural genetic counseling has focused on simplistic knowledge of clien t health beliefs and cultural customs, professional cultures, and biased th eoretical models as reasons for failure to create realistic knowledge of me mbers of racial-cultural groups in the United States, Recognizing the impor tance of meeting the needs for all who seek genetic counseling services, ge netic counselors have been providing direction in crosscultural genetic cou nseling research, practice, training, and developing competency, ethical, a nd professional guidelines. However, emanating from a cultural pluralism pe rspective, cross-cultural genetic counseling has often resulted in homogeni zed group stereotypes without attention to intragroup variation and individ ual differences. A transition from cross-cultural towards multicultural gen etics shifts from culture-specific group norms to an integrated social, his torical, psychological, and political perspective. By valuing the process o f personal and professional racial-cultural identity development, the evolu tion from cross-cultural to multicultural genetic counseling that has occur red within the past quarter century is discussed. (C) 2001 Wiley-Liss, Inc.