A small Massachusetts hospital will shut down in two years because it is just not seeing enough patients, the CEO of its parent company says.
Operations at Baystate Mary Lane Outpatient Center in Ware will gradually be shifted to other facilities including Baystate Wing Hospital in Palmer, Dr. Mark Keroack, president and CEO of Springfield-based Baystate Health said Tuesday.
“We are simply not seeing people go there when they are sick,” Keroack said, according to Masslive.com.
Nearly half of the facility’s capacity is unused during the day and 90% is unused overnight, he said. It’s hard to recruit doctors to the facility and tough to maintain a century-old building, he said.
Baystate plans to close the emergency room as early as June. Some work will shift to Wing, while cancer care services will transition to the D’Amour Center for Cancer Care in Springfield. About 80 employees at Mary Lane will see their jobs transferred or will be offered other jobs within the system.
Keroack, who once saw patients at the former Mary Lane Hospital and whose parents were born there, said he understands there will be some anger in the community.
The plan will be submitted to the state Department of Public Health for review.