National CLAS Standards
National Standards for Culturally and Linguistically Appropriate Services (CLAS) in Health and Health Care
View the Standards (PDF - 48 KB)
CLAS
For us, CLAS is a way to improve the quality of services provided to all individuals, which will ultimately help reduce health disparities and achieve health equity. CLAS is about respect and responsiveness: Respect the whole individual and Respond to the individual’s health needs and preferences.
What is CLAS?
The Standards
The National CLAS Standards
The National CLAS Standards are a set of 15 action steps intended to advance health equity, improve quality, and help eliminate health care disparities by providing a blueprint for individuals and health and health care organizations to implement culturally and linguistically appropriate services.
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Guidance
The Blueprint
The Blueprint for Advancing and Sustaining CLAS Policy and Practice is an implementation guide for the National CLAS Standards. It explains each Standard’s purpose, components, and strategies for implementation. It also offers additional resources to learn more about each Standard.
View the Blueprint
Other Policies
Crosswalks
Interested in comparing the National CLAS Standards to organizational accreditation standards or performance metrics? Here are some resources.
View Crosswalks
History
Timeline
Learn more about the major moments in health equity history.
View the Timeline