Ross–Loos Medical Group was a comprehensive prepaid health services plan with 29 medical offices throughout

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

Orange Orange most often refers to: *Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis'' ** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower ** Orange juice *Orange (colour), the color of an orange fruit, occurs between red and yellow in the vi ...

, Riverside, and

San Bernardino San Bernardino ( ) is a city in and the county seat of San Bernardino County, California, United States. Located in the Inland Empire region of Southern California, the city had a population of 222,101 in the 2020 census, making it the List of ...

counties in

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

and a large multi-specialty

hospital A hospital is a healthcare institution providing patient treatment with specialized Medical Science, health science and auxiliary healthcare staff and medical equipment. The best-known type of hospital is the general hospital, which typically ...

located on Temple Street,

Founding

Ross-Loos was established in 1929 by two

physician A physician, medical practitioner (British English), medical doctor, or simply doctor is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through the Medical education, study, Med ...

s: Donald E. Ross and H. Clifford Loos, older brother of writer

Anita Loos Corinne Anita Loos (April 26, 1888 – August 18, 1981) was an American actress, novelist, playwright and screenwriter. In 1912, she became the first female staff screenwriter in Hollywood (film industry), Hollywood, when D. W. Griffith put h ...

. The plan consisted of monthly payments which assured benefits of medical and hospital care to over two thousand

employee Employment is a relationship between two party (law), parties Regulation, regulating the provision of paid Labour (human activity), labour services. Usually based on a employment contract, contract, one party, the employer, which might be a cor ...

s of Los Angeles County and the

Department of Water and Power The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) is the largest municipal utility in the United States with 8,100 megawatts of electric generating capacity (2021–2022) and delivering an average of 435 million gallons of water per day (487, ...

and their families. The founders believed that

health care Health care, or healthcare, is the improvement or maintenance of health via the preventive healthcare, prevention, diagnosis, therapy, treatment, wikt:amelioration, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other disability, physic ...

could be improved by combining prepayment of services, eliminating the financial barriers faced by

patient A patient is any recipient of health care services that are performed by Health professional, healthcare professionals. The patient is most often Disease, ill or Major trauma, injured and in need of therapy, treatment by a physician, nurse, op ...

s at the time of needed care, with the sharing of medical records and the ease of consultation in a medical group. The focus was on the improvement of medical care quality, rather than financial success, and many concepts in those plans built on a public health approach that encouraged prevention. The plans included

prenatal care Prenatal care, also known as antenatal care, is a type of preventive healthcare for pregnant individuals. It is provided in the form of medical checkups and healthy lifestyle recommendations for the pregnant person. Antenatal care also consists of ...

, well-baby visits, and

immunizations Immunization, or immunisation, is the process by which an individual's immune system becomes fortified against an infectious agent (known as the immunogen). When this system is exposed to molecules that are foreign to the body, called ''non-sel ...

in standard benefit packages, with small or zero co-payments, at a time that even the hospital costs of maternity stays were often excluded from traditional

insurance Insurance is a means of protection from financial loss in which, in exchange for a fee, a party agrees to compensate another party in the event of a certain loss, damage, or injury. It is a form of risk management, primarily used to protect ...

. Ross–Loos Medical Group is the first

HMO In the United States, a health maintenance organization (HMO) is a medical insurance group that provides health services for a fixed annual fee. It is an organization that provides or arranges managed care for health insurance, self-funded heal ...

in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

; the term "

managed care In the United States, managed care or managed healthcare is a group of activities intended to reduce the cost of providing health care and providing health insurance while improving the quality of that care. It has become the predominant system o ...

" came about chiefly through the influence of U.S.

President Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 until his resignation in 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as the 36th vice president under P ...

on February 17, 1971. Over several years many other employee groups, mostly governmental, joined the plan. Ross-Loos was so successful that the first small medical office on Grand Avenue in Los Angeles expanded into an enormous organization with 29 medical offices and a large multi-specialty hospital, on Temple Street, Los Angeles, by 1979.

Purchases

In 1980, Ross–Loos Medical Group was purchased by the

Insurance Company of North America Insurance Company of North America (INA) is the oldest capital stock insurance company in the United States, founded in Philadelphia in 1792. It was one of the largest American insurance companies of the 19th and 20th centuries before merging with ...

(INA) HealthPlan (see HMO International and California Medical Group and merged into its medical office operations which created over twenty-nine medical office locations throughout southern California. Its new name was "INA and Ross-Loos HealthPlans". This new operational name was in existence a short time until 1982; through a merger of the

(INA) and Connecticut General (CG) their names changed to become

CIGNA The Cigna Group is an American multinational for-profit managed healthcare and insurance company based in Bloomfield, Connecticut. Its insurance subsidiaries are major providers of medical, dental, disability, life and accident insurance and r ...

. Ross–Loos Medical Group, became known as CIGNA HealthPlans of Southern California and was merged into the large CIGNA Employee Benefits Division. In 1997 CIGNA made a decision to divest itself of its " owned delivery system" or " staff model" (see

– staff model) and sold their operations to MedPartners. The sale to MedPartners also caused a new name change of the CIGNA "owned delivery system" in

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural List of regions of California, region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Its densely populated coastal reg ...

, The system became merged into the recent purchase in

by Medpartners of the Friendly Hills Medical Group. In 1999, MedPartners was placed in receivership for its inability to manage the combined operations of its Southern California subsidiaries Friendly Hills Medical Group, Talbert Medical Group, Mullikan Medical Group, Vineyard Medical Group, and Riverside Medical Clinic. Those MedPartners-owned facilities were divested and sold to physician-owned delivery systems or closed. The MedPartners name was changed to

Caremark Rx CVS Caremark (formerly Caremark Rx) is the pharmacy benefit management subsidiary of CVS Health, headquartered in Woonsocket, Rhode Island. Company history Early years CVS Caremark was founded in 1993 as MedPartners, Inc. in Birmingham, Alab ...

, the Talbert Medical Group was sold to the physicians of the Talbert Medical Group; the Riverside Medical Clinic was sold back to the member physicians, remaining in operation, with over 130 physicians; and the Mullikan and Vineyard Medical Groups were eventually closed. The Friendly Hills Medical Group was acquired by KPC Global Care, now in Chadhuri Medical Group, and briefly continued operations until it too was placed into receivership by the

California Department of Corporations The California Department of Corporations (DOC) was a department within the former California Business, Transportation and Housing Agency in California. The chief officer of the Department was the Commissioner of Corporations. Effective July 1, 2 ...

in 1999 and closed down. The original Ross–Loos Medical Group facilities were closed and Medical Center – Hospital on Temple Street in Los Angeles was sold t
Silverlake Medical Center
then eventually sold and rename
L.A. Downtown Medical Center
The original Ross–Loos Medical Group, medical offices and hospital ended with that sale in 1999 some 70 years after its beginning.

Current status

The names "Ross-Loos", "Ross Loos Medical Group", and "Ross Loos HealthPlans" are still owned by CIGNA Corporation and remain registered with the State of California Department of Corporations, Department of Insurance, and Department of Managed Care. A street in the

Echo Park Echo Park is a neighborhood in the east-Central Los Angeles, central region of Los Angeles, California. Located to the northwest of Downtown Los Angeles, Downtown, it is bordered by Silver Lake, Los Angeles, Silver Lake to the west and Chinato ...

neighborhood of Los Angeles bears the nam
Ross Loos Place
The road leads to the Medical Center.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ross-Loos Medical Group Healthcare in Los Angeles 1929 establishments in California Health maintenance organizations Health care companies established in 1929