Baystate Health closing wound care unit at Mary Lane Outpatient Center in Ware

Baystate Health confirmed this week it will close the wound care unit at Baystate Mary Lane Outpatient Center less than two years after it opened. The Springfield-based health care provider said the decision to close the unit on Jan. 31 was “due to lack of demand” at the Ware facility.

“Baystate Mary Lane has decided not to renew its vendor relationship with Healogic Wound Care due to lack of demand for hyperbaric chambers,” the provider said in a statement.

Mary Lane had been an acute care hospital until 2016, when Baystate Health won state approval to change the facility’s to an outpatient center, while keeping the 24-7 emergency room for ambulance calls.

Baystate Health offers a wound care unit at Baystate Wing Hospital in Palmer.

Baystate Health Eastern Region President Molly Gray will attend a Feb. 2 meeting with selectmen to discuss Mary Lane, including the closed wound care center, according to Ware Town Manager Stuart Beckley.

There was a ribbon cutting ceremony less than two years ago, inaugurating the new Baystate Mary Lane New Wound Care and Hyperbaric Medicine Center.

In a release announcing the Feb. 15, 2019 ribbon cutting, Baystate Health said the new facility would provide “a variety of wound care treatment options, including state-of-the-art hyperbaric oxygen chambers to focus on the treatment of chronic wounds, offer relief for ulcers, infections and difficult-to-heal wounds. Leading edge treatments at the center will include negative pressure wound therapy, bio-engineered tissues, biosynthetic dressings and growth factor therapies. The center also will offer hyperbaric oxygen therapy, which works by surrounding the patient with 100 percent oxygen to help progress the healing of the wound.”