Some docs just get it. Medicine is simply a customer-service business:

It is not just a matter of moving to a small town. Ms. Kissell’s doctor, Melissa Gerdes, is one of a rapidly growing number of physicians who have streamlined their schedules and added Internet services, among other steps, to better meet the needs of patients. For physicians like Dr. Gerdes, it is simply good business.

Those doctors know that as walk-in medical offices and retail-store clinics pose new competition, and as shrinking insurance benefits mean patients are paying more of their own bills, family care medicine is more than ever a consumer-service business. And it pays to keep the customer satisfied.