The Importance of a Community Health Network: An Ethnoanthropological Approach, the Experience of Teaching Demoethnoanthropology of the Degree Course in Nursing at the University of Parma

Although Italy has a long history of migration behind it, it seems unable to convey the long experience accumulated over 150 years on its territory. There seems to be a lack of a network of contacts and relationships with communities of different cultures and social distress in the area of health, where there is a virtuous experiment, even well functional, but not really structured in a network. The COVID-19 Pandemic has shown that the inherent weaknesses in the sphere of migration and social hardship, which have worsened in the absence of a community health network; cultural, linguistic, social barriers, of knowledge of services and institutions, have been widened due to the impossibility of travel and the lack of individual institutional references that could provide indications, information and guidance. The creation of a network of contacts for the teaching of Demoethnoanthropology of the Nursing Studies course at the University of Parma has shown how a culturally competent and correct anthropological approach can provide communities with a channel of orientation and adherence through pre-built direct contact. The network of contacts built by the demo-ethnoanthropology course was born in the year 2013, when a discussion of involvement of the communities of different cultures of the territory is initiated, in a part of the training course of the course. The idea was to exploit university indications regarding the “Third Mission” by involving the cultural diversity of the area in an interaction between the university, students and communities both in the representative offices of the communities and in the university classrooms. The initiative, much appreciated by the representatives and members of the communities, involved a large part of those present in the territory of the city of Parma and the province. The first meetings brought in the classrooms representatives with an important university education, but also young university students and more. In 2015 we created that series of events known as “Cultural coffee” of the nursing study course, unique cultural encounters in Italy for this type of course held within a hospital dining area, therefore in a context outside the classrooms and open to the public in fact we added an element that was required by the Emilia Romagna region that is, bringing events with multicultural characteristics into common places among ordinary people. Over the years, public meetings and going with students to the associative centers of the communities, including the Islamic culture center of Parma, the Gurdwara Singh Saba associative headquarters, the Zoe pentecostal mission of Parma have increased institutional knowledge of the course and created a vast network of relationships. In order to build community involvement with an intention that is also inclusive, an institutional relationship more dedicated to health has also been initiated, since the same communities, aware of our dual role as teachers and nurses, have begun to ask us questions and requests in this regard. to health, to the approach to care, exposing basic care needs, effectively communicating the lack of an interconnection between community and health institution and seeing in our professional figure a simpler channel of approach.