In a recent letter to shareholders, Dr. Thomas Hall shared a favored maxim: "Good things come to those who wait."
The waiting does seem over for the company he runs, Medical Advisory Systems Inc., thanks largely to the explosion of the Internet and people's hunger for information about the aches and ills they suffer.
Calvert County-based Medical Advisory Systems grabbed hold of both trends late last year when it agreed to provide Web site operator America's Doctor with physicians to conduct free, private, real-time "chats" online. The contract for the Web site, Americasdoctor.com, and the company's close financial ties to America's Doctor have transformed the 18-year-old company, fueling a dramatic run-up in the stock of what was previously a little-known provider of medical guidance to crews on oil rigs and ships at sea and to customers of travel insurance companies.
To handle the contract with Owings Mills-based America's Doctor -- which some analysts expect to go public this year -- MAS has added 100 physicians to run the company's Owings call center on a around-the-clock schedule -- a big step up from the 18 physicians there to handle the maritime and insurance calls.
The new Internet "chat" service, launched in September, initially handled about 1,000 queries daily. Today, said Hall, it's averaging 5,000 to 7,000 -- more than double initial expectations.
The America's Doctor site offers a library of information on diseases and treatments, medical news and links to hospitals that have paid for the advertising.
It's the free, live, private chat service with physicians that distinguishes it from the rest of the pack, industry analysts say.
And Hall believes that novelty has helped make the America's Doctor Web site such a hit.
"We're finding there's a real hunger for this type of information. People want to get their medical questions answered quickly and conveniently," said Hall, MAS's chief executive officer since 1992.
Revenue from MAS' contract with America's Doctor in its first quarter of operations helped the company quadruple its earnings in its most recent quarter to $133,345 vs. the same quarter a year ago.
For its most recent fiscal year, which ended Oct. 31, MAS booked a net profit of $529,663 on revenue of $3.3 million compared with a $358,000 profit on revenue of $2.6 million the prior year.
Most of the $700,000 increase in 1998 revenue resulted from up-front payments due under the America's Doctor deal. MAS' chairman and founder, Ronald W. Pickett, said the agreement calls for America's Doctor to cover staffing and other costs, plus a 10 percent fee. That fee rises to 20 percent May 1. Pickett said the company projects that the Internet contract will result in $1.4 million in profit on revenue of $8 million during its current fiscal year.
The earnings outlook and the company's new association with the Internet has had a dramatic effect on MAS' stock price. From $4 in early January, the shares soared to a high of $18.25 two weeks ago, and closed Friday at $17.125.
In late January, daily trading volume pierced the 100,000 mark -- 10 times the number of shares that would have been traded on a very active day a year ago.
Next month, the makeover continues. That's when MAS hopes to parlay the success of the chat service into another cash stream: Doc-Talk, a service that will allow chat room visitors to get on the phone with one of MAS' physicians to pop medical questions.
Last month, MAS raised $3 million to fund advertising and other start-up costs for Doc-Talk.
Unlike the free Web service, Doc-Talk likely will charge a fee of about $12.95 per call, said Pickett. He said the service -- which the company began planning even before the America's Doctor contract -- eventually will be aimed at a broad consumer market through television and other advertising. For example, Pickett said, the company hopes to strike up media relationships under which Doc-Talk's phone number would be broadcast after televised health programs.
Again, because of liability issues, callers won't get specific medical advice or individual diagnosis for the problem they describe, says Hall.
"We will not treat patients," he said.
Instead, physicians will provide guidance on where callers can get specific medical information about ailments, Hall said.
It remains to be seen whether hordes of people will pay for information they could get in greater detail from their own doctor or a reputable in-depth family medical book.
Analysts are split on whether Doc-Talk has the potential to be a moneymaker, based on the success of the America's Doctor chat room service and the Internet's promise of convenience and anonymity.
Scott Reents, an Internet industry analyst with Cyber Dialogue, a New York-based market research firm, said health care Web sites eventually will seek to make money by charging for many services now offered for free to build brand identities and drum up traffic.
"It's my guess it will probably be sites that offer a big menu of services from medical information to filling prescriptions," he said.
But the analyst is skeptical that people will be willing to pay to chat online or talk by phone with a doctor if the information they get is too general because of legal constraints.
"I just don't see it working financially," Reents said. "What would work is if you could get online with your own doctor."
Ron Attkisson, a partner at Attkisson, Carter and Akers, an Atlanta brokerage that recently began after MAS, disagrees and believes several trends favor growth.
"Many people don't seem to have the personal relationship with their doctor that we used to have; people can ask a question without being embarrassed or feeling like they're taking up their doctor's time," he said.
"The other appeal here is the anonymity," said Attkisson.
Hall, who joined the company in 1982 as chief physician, said the company is so bullish on revenue prospects for the new service and the America's Doctor relationship that it applied last month for the company's stock to move from the Bulletin Board to the Nasdaq small-cap market.
Another potential revenue upside for MAS, said Attkisson, is its 17 percent ownership of America's Doctor. MAS has invested $2.5 million in America's Doctor, launched by Baltimore physician and entrepreneur Scott Rifkin, since striking the chat contract.
Attkisson believes that America's Doctor will eventually present itself as an IPO candidate, and notes that such an offering would enhance MAS' worth and leverage -- if it's a success.
At least one Internet-based health information company has already tapped the public market. Bermuda-based Mediconsult.com raised $35 million in a recent IPO.
"Every new industry spans fragmentation at first; eventually the pretenders fall and the strong survive and consolidate," said Attkisson. "It will be no different with the Internet. We think America's Doctor will be one of the ones left standing."
For now, fragmentation -- and hence competition -- reign. Health and medical information sites abound on the Web.
Cyber Dialogue, a New York-based market research firm, estimates that 18 million Americans used online sites to search for medical information last year. That's about the same number that searched the Web for financial information. And about half of the 2,000 adults queried by Cyber Dialogue in a survey said they would be interested in buying health-related products online.
Things weren't always so rosy for MAS.
The company posted losses for its first 10 years. In 1990 it turned profitable, and has since posted earnings of less than $500,00 annually.
But the core businesses never did much for shareholders. As recently as January, shares traded for $4 and change. In February of last year, they traded for 30 cents.
America's Doctor and MAS began structuring a deal after an acquaintance of Pickett's -- Rifkin's brother, Baltimore lawyer Alan Rifkin -- suggested that a business relationship might prove fruitful.
"This is a company with real earnings, something you don't see with most of these Internet companies," Attkisson said. "They also have 18 years of experience providing medical information in an interactive way. Nobody else that we know of has this much experience with interactive communication and medicine."