Creating a good practice website is a tall order. It's as challenging as creating a brick-and-mortar medical office that's both attractive and practical.

After scouring the Internet and reviewing dozens of practice websites, we came up with three worth emulating. They're virtual offices for medical groups that range from little to big: The three-doctor Northern Virginia Family Practice Associates in Alexandria; the 22-doctor Granite Medical in Quincy, MA; and the 80-doctor Bristol Park Medical Group in suburban Los Angeles.

All three websites score high in the four criteria we used for judging what's out there.

Helpful content: This includes ample patient education material, instructions on making appointments and paying bills, and physician bios.

Ease of use: Patients easily find what they're looking for and don't get lost.

Online services: Patients can do things like register online, request an appointment or a prescription refill, view lab results, or ask their doctor a question.

None of the three websites are homemade, which speaks to the need to hire a professional designer. "The web has matured as a cultural medium, so people have higher expectations," says New York pediatric otolaryngologist Michael Rothschild, who's written and spoken extensively about practice websites. "People tolerated crude sites in 1995, but in 2006, they know in a few seconds whether a site is professional or not."

To evaluate practice websites, we sought professional advice from computer consultant Rosemarie Nelson in Syracuse, NY, and practice management consultant Sarah Wiskerchen with KarenZupko & Associates in Chicago. Here's a look at key features of three websites that make the grade.

Bristol Park Medical Group
( http://www.bristolparkmed.com|~www.bristolparkmed.com)

With a bar of navigation buttons on the left-hand side of every page, visitors find their way around the Bristol Park Medical Group site easily. Any one page is only two or three mouse clicks away. Hint: Do not put a navigation bar at the bottom of a long page and force patients to scroll down to use it.

The Bristol Park site lists health plans that the group participates in, and provides links to those plans.

Northern Virginia Family Practice Associates
( http://www.nvafamilypractice.com|~www.nvafamilypractice.com)

A photograph of the physicians and nurse practitioners at Northern Virginia Family Practice Associates gives the home page a strong, inviting graphic element. Hint: Do not go overboard with graphics or animation; otherwise web pages may load too slowly, tempting visitors to go elsewhere. The navigation bar at the top displays a full range of online services. Ninety-five percent of new patients register through the website.