IT CAN PAY OFF to be different. Just ask the folks at Dependable Medical Systems, a Pomona, Calif.-based home medical equipment provider-with a difference.

The company supplies a full range of HME, which it delivers with a hearty dose of multicultural communication skills. If that sounds simple, it isn't. Dependable Medical Systems is in a Los Angeles suburb that is a melting pot of cultures. It is not unusual for employees to run into problems with patients because of cultural differences, says Alberto Carbonilla, Dependable's business manager. And those problems can result in a patient's noncompliance.

"People take for granted that if they have technical and medical skills, they will be able to do their jobs well," says Carbonilla. "There's often a lack of awareness that communication can be a very powerful skill in doing their jobs well."

Some cultures, for example, communicate indirectly, which doesn't always work well with those who are what Carbonilla calls "content-focused"-taking everything at face value. Other people do not respond well to certain words, such as "report," "documentation" or "authority." Still others operate on the basis of hierarchy, and unless the health care professional identifies the authority figure in the home-which might not be the patient-the medical treatment plan might not be implemented, he says.

The multicultural communication differences in his marketplace struck a chord with Carbonilla, himself of Filipino and Chinese extraction, as he looked for a way to set Dependable apart from the competition. His background includes working as a cross-cultural trainer for the State Department in the resettlement of Laotian, Cambodian and Vietnamese refugees, and training Japanese executives moving to the United States about American ways.

So Carbonilla, with the blessing of owners Anthony and Corazon Ingalla, instituted an employee training program, "Communicating with Multicultural Clients in the Health Care Industry." Once a week, employees meet to learn how to communicate with all cultures and to share problems and solutions. Carbonilla says it has made a difference.

"You see people perking up their ears and saying, 'That's why this is a problem!'" he says, noting that the staff deals more easily now with cultural differences. "And they can deal better with the patients, they can deal with each other, and they can deal with their superiors."

Two years after it began, the program is branching out. Dependable now offers it to local hospitals and home health agencies. They can choose from among several subjects for an hour-long class, including Five Basic Truths About Communication, Understanding Different Cultures and Intercultural Communication Skills.

Dependable doesn't charge for the course, but it has paid off for the company. Its client base has doubled in the last two years, Carbonilla reports.

"As a marketing strategy, it has really worked well," he says. "People start calling [after attending a class]-the director of nurses calls, or the nurses order equipment. They're more willing to give us a try. ... We're not just the DME that came in with a bunch of magnets or a bunch of chocolates. We've become a DME company that cares a little bit more about what we do."