Introduction:

Culturally diverse populations converge in Bogotá, making compassion and cultural competence challenging to recognize suffering, understand it, and alleviate it through culturally appropriate and acceptable interventions.

Objective:

To describe the experiences of nursing teams from two hospitals in Bogotá regarding compassion and care for culturally diverse people.

Methods:

Qualitative descriptive study, 28 auxiliary and professional nurses from two hospitals in Bogotá participated; semi-structured interviews were audio-recorded and analyzed thematically.

Results:

Two themes emerged: (1) Culturally competent and compassionate care is reflected in small acts; (2) The quotidian of care and overcoming barriers.

Conclusions:

Experiences of compassion and cultural competence are multiple, expressed through small acts, which can be especially valuable to care subjects. However, the context imposes barriers to be faced in caring for culturally diverse people.

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