Various businesses across Los Angeles from radio stations to grocers and apparel stores have tapped into eye-popping growth in recent years by orienting themselves to appeal to the swelling Latino population.

And now a Long Beach health care company is doing likewise, and getting similar results.

Latino HealthCare, founded in 1996, has grown to become the largest individual practice association, or IPA, exclusively targeting Latinos in the area, and has now branched out beyond Los Angeles County.

Latino HealthCare has steadily built a stable of nearly 300 primary care doctors operating in Latino neighborhoods by catering to Latino patients with health insurance who prefer individual practices over large clinic settings.

“We know there is a segment of the Latino population that responds to what we have to offer. Some want the big clinics, but a very large part of our population wants to go to Dr. Sanchez on the corner,” said co-founder Jose Gonzalez. “I like to say, ‘We just do chicken, rice and beans, but we do it well.'”

The company’s network of physicians, which counting specialists totals 2,500, stretches south to San Diego County and north to Santa Clara. Meanwhile, its for-profit competitors are largely clinic based.

Gonzalez, who started in the field in 1973, founded Latino HealthCare with Dr. Roberto Chiprut, a physician who had written a book on how Latinos like to interact with health care providers.

The idea interested Cedars-Sinai Medical Center enough to kick in $1 million to help get the company off the ground.

“They were going to target the Latino market, which they didn’t believe was well served,” said Rick Jacobs, Cedars-Sinai’s senior vice president for system development. “And with our community responsibilities as a major medical center, we were looking for ways to better reach out to the Latino community.”

However, building the business was not easy, especially the first couple of years as the company struggled to attract managed care plans that were very picky about signing on new IPAs.

One problem was that HMOs, which must oversee the physician management groups under contract, don’t want to sign up groups that may compete with others they already have on contract.

Making Latino HealthCare’s growth particularly noteworthy is that it has come amid the closures of numerous physician management groups, including the high-profile failure of KPC Medical Management in November.

Ultimately, the company won contracts with Blue Shield of California, Health Net and Universal Care, the largest privately held HMO in California, among others.

“You can’t sign up everybody out there,” said Jeff Davis, Universal’s chief operating officer. “But (Latino HealthCare) has a number of Hispanic physicians that do speak the language and understand the culture, which is an important part of choosing a provider network that will take care of a lot of our members.”

Steady progress

Latino HealthCare’s membership grew slowly at first, but last year ballooned more than 50 percent to some 30,000 members. The target this year is to hit 50,000 members.

The company’s revenues reached $12 million in 2000, nearly double the $6.5 million of 1999. The company hopes to grow revenues to at least $16 million this year, Gonzalez said.

About 60 percent of the company’s membership has private insurance, with the remainder served by Medi-Cal, California’s version of Medicaid, the Healthy Families program for children of the working poor, and Medicare.

With the state trying to ensure that all families eligible for public health care access it, the company has been able to market its services directly in schools and other places you might not expect to find a for-profit company.

It also markets itself at fairs, churches and other functions where it can meet potential members one-on-one.

“We don’t believe that the action of buying insurance or selecting doctors is something that works well through an advertising campaign on television,” Gonzalez said. “It is better to reach Latinos through one-on-one grassroots outreach.”

The company also has been successful working with municipal contractors, such as janitorial services, that under new city regulations are required to provide health insurance for their workers, he said.

“If someone could put together a package of health insurance benefits for the low-wage employers and their employees, there is probably a good market there,” said Cass Ben-Levi of the Community Clinic Association of Los Angeles.

The company’s ability to make money in the Latino health care market, a segment traditionally viewed as not being particularly lucrative, has elevated the public profile of Gonzalez in health care circles.

He has been appointed to an advisory committee to the new state Department of Managed Health Care. He also recently spoke at a conference held by the California Primary Care Association, a Sacramento-based trade group representing 500 nonprofit community clinics.