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Hispanic patients make health decisions within specific cultural frameworks: family-centered decision-making, varying levels of trust in medical institutions,
By Wilson Camelo, President & CMO, Camelo Communication
Hispanic patients make health decisions within specific cultural frameworks: family-centered decision-making, varying levels of trust in medical institutions, language barriers that go beyond vocabulary, and acculturation levels that range from recent immigrants to third-generation Americans. Organizations that simply translate their English materials into Spanish and call it "Hispanic outreach" are missing most of their audience, and the data proves it.
As a marketer who has worked with healthcare systems for over 2o years, I’ve seen a similar pattern with many health organizations and the pattern is almost always the same. A hospital or health system recognizes that its service area has a significant Hispanic population. Someone in marketing is asked to "do something for the Hispanic market." The result? Translated ads and brochures. Maybe a few social media posts in Spanish during Hispanic Heritage Month.
If the needle doesn’t move, they often blame the market for not responding.
The Translation Trap
Let me say this clearly: translation is not a marketing strategy or approach.
When you translate a message that was conceived, written, and designed with insights for a general market audience, you may get a grammatically correct version of a message, but it will not resonate at all. Culture plays a significant role in how Hispanics view health, even death, and these must be incorporated in messages.
Here's an example I use in presentations. A major health system ran a campaign encouraging patients to "take charge of your health." Strong message for a general market audience raised on American individualism. But in many Hispanic households, health decisions are collective "Take charge of your health" speaks to an individual. "Protect the health of your family" speaks to a value. Same goal. Completely different emotional register.
That difference — between translating words and transcreating meaning — is the difference between a campaign that checks a box and one that changes behavior.
The Cultural Factors That Matter
If you're a healthcare marketer trying to reach Hispanic patients effectively, here are the cultural dynamics you need to understand:
Family-centered decision-making. In many Hispanic households, healthcare decisions are not made by individuals in isolation. The family — particularly mothers and grandmothers — plays a central role in deciding when to seek care, which provider to trust, and whether to follow through on treatment. Marketing that speaks only to the individual patient misses the decision-maker.
Trust and institutional skepticism. Hispanic patients, particularly immigrants and first-generation Americans, often carry a deep skepticism toward medical institutions. This may stem from negative experiences with healthcare in their country of origin, fears related to immigration status, or simply the experience of not being understood — linguistically or culturally — in clinical settings. According to research published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, Latinx patients are more likely to report mistrust of healthcare providers and are less satisfied with the care they receive than non-Latinx whites.
Language is more than words. Sixty-eight percent of Hispanics age 5 and older speak a language other than English at home, and about 28% report speaking English "less than very well" (HHS Office of Minority Health, 2024). But language barriers in healthcare go beyond vocabulary. One in four Spanish-speaking Hispanic adults have difficulty finding a language-concordant healthcare provider (Urban Institute, 2025). And 83% of Spanish-speaking Hispanic adults say it's very or somewhat important for their provider to speak their language or provide translation services.
Acculturation is a spectrum. The Hispanic market is not a monolith. A recently arrived family from Guatemala has very different health beliefs, media habits, and language preferences than a third-generation Mexican American family in Texas. Effective health marketing requires segmentation within the Hispanic market — by acculturation level, country of origin, language preference, and geography.
Health literacy matters. Hispanic and Latino individuals are more likely to have lower levels of health literacy compared to other racial and ethnic groups. When you combine lower health literacy with language barriers and cultural differences in how health information is received and processed, the case for culturally adapted materials — not just translated ones — becomes impossible to ignore.
What Healthcare Systems Get Wrong
Beyond the translation trap, here are the most common mistakes I see:
Treating Hispanic outreach as a seasonal effort. Hispanic Heritage Month is September 15 to October 15. Your Hispanic patients need healthcare 365 days a year. If your multicultural marketing shows up for one month and disappears, you're not building a relationship — you're performing one.
Burying Spanish-language content. If a Spanish-speaking patient visits your website and has to click through three menus to find content in their language, you've already lost them. Language access should be immediate, prominent, and integrated — not an afterthought hidden in a footer link.
Using stock photography that doesn't reflect the community. Hispanic patients notice when the smiling family in your ad looks nothing like their family. Representation matters in healthcare marketing — not as a political statement, but as a basic signal that your organization sees and serves their community.
Not building relationships. The Spanish-language media and community organizations have the ear and the trust of the community. Ignoring their influence and importance to Hispanics is a clear way to build barriers rather than create relationships.
What Effective Hispanic Health Marketing Looks Like
The healthcare systems doing this well share a few common characteristics:
They start with cultural intelligence, not just creative briefs. Before developing campaigns, they invest in understanding the specific Hispanic communities in their service areas — their demographics, their health concerns, their media habits, their barriers to care.
They transcreate, they don't translate. Every piece of patient-facing communication is developed with cultural context from the start — not adapted from English after the fact. The Spanish-language version isn't a derivative of the English version. It's a parallel creation built for its audience.
They invest in community trust. They are active in the community. They sponsor community health events. They partner with churches, schools, and community organizations. They hire bilingual staff and promote them visibly. They show up consistently and not just when they have a campaign to run.
They measure what matters. Hispanic patient acquisition. Enrollment in preventive care programs. Show rates for screenings. Community awareness metrics in specific ZIP codes. They set KPIs tied to health equity outcomes and report against them with the same rigor as their general market metrics.
At Camelo Communication, this is the work we do every day for healthcare systems and public health agencies across the country. If your organization is ready to move beyond translation and build authentic connections with the Hispanic communities you serve, let's talk about your approach.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why doesn't translating health materials work for Hispanic patients?
Translation converts words but misses cultural context, emotional resonance, and the specific values that drive health decisions in Hispanic households. Culturally adapted messaging — built with an understanding of family dynamics, trust barriers, acculturation levels, and health literacy — consistently outperforms translated content.
What cultural factors affect how Hispanic patients receive health messaging?
Key factors include family-centered decision-making (where mothers and grandmothers often drive healthcare choices), institutional skepticism (particularly among immigrants), language barriers beyond vocabulary, varying acculturation levels, and lower average health literacy among Spanish-speaking populations.
What is the difference between language access and cultural competency in healthcare marketing?
Language access means providing materials in a patient's preferred language. Cultural competency means understanding the values, beliefs, family structures, and lived experiences that shape how a community receives and acts on health information. Effective Hispanic health marketing requires both.
How do you build trust with Hispanic communities in healthcare marketing?
Trust is built through consistent presence, culturally authentic messaging, community partnerships, bilingual staff visibility, and messaging that acknowledges real barriers — including affordability, immigration concerns, and historical experiences of being underserved. Trust is not built through a translated brochure.
How many Hispanic adults face language barriers in healthcare?
About 28% of Hispanics report speaking English "less than very well," and one in four Spanish-speaking Hispanic adults have difficulty finding a healthcare provider who speaks their language or provides adequate translation services.
