I used the "Find Providers" search through my insurance company, and filtered for Family Doctors who are accepting new patients and found Dr. Walend. I called her office at East Valley Family Physicians to make a new patient appointment and waited on hold for 8 minutes. When I finally got through, the receptionist/scheduler informed me that Dr. Walend was not accepting new patients. I said "Oh, the insurance website said that she is" and I was told that they have to tell the insurance that they are accepting new patients in order to be one of their providers. I said okay, thanks, and that was the end of the conversation. Not "Hey, we have many other doctors would you like to schedule an appointment with someone else?" or anything. Totally uninterested in my business.
To top that off, it's just not true that they have to tell the insurance that they are accepting new patients. There are plenty of providers listed, Tier 1 providers, that were kind enough to inform the insurance company that they were not taking new patients. After seeing the other reviews I'm now relieved that this practice weeded themselves out.