SuperTrack pulls plug on Bay Medical acquisition

Bay Medical Clinic will close permanently at the end of April, after its acquisition by SuperTrack, a group of Whatcom County medical clinics, fell through.

SuperTrack started operating Bay Medical Clinic on January 1 and had planned to eventually expand the practice to include urgent care services. However, the partners of SuperTrack recently notified Dr. David Allan, who opened the Blaine clinic four decades ago with his wife Dr. Marta Kazymyra, that the transition will no longer be going forward.

“After many attempts, we were unsuccessful in coming up with alternate providers,” said Dr. Allan. “This was our last-ditch effort. We were confident of this last proposal but the logistics of the transfer became insurmountable.”

Dr. Allan said that SuperTrack, which operates two medical clinics in Bellingham and one in Point Roberts, was likely deterred by the costs of expanding to Blaine. “With the amount that was going to have to go into it, they said it was getting too complicated,” he said. “They would have needed to fix the building, put electronic records in and so forth.” SuperTrack partners Dr. Sean Bozorgzadeh and Dr. Mae Lary did not respond to requests for comment.

Dr. Allan apologized to the clinic’s patients for the “rollercoaster” of the past year, as the clinic made various announcements about its lengthy search for new providers, its impending closure, the last-minute acquisition by SuperTrack and now its permanent closure at the end of April.

“We are very sorry that the many direction changes have inconvenienced people and are extremely sad to be leaving patients without a primary care provider in Blaine,” he said.

The closure of the decades-old Blaine clinic will leave the city without any MDs or any Medicare doctors. Family Care Network recently agreed to purchase city-owned land for a new medical center, but construction has not yet started and the facility is not expected to open for at least two years.

Dr. Kazymyra retired at the end of December, and Dr. Allan, who had planned to stay on board with SuperTrack part-time, will now likely retire as well. He said he plans to do some traveling and volunteering. Medicine has forever changed, he said. “Single family practice is not viable anymore,” he said. “You just can’t pay your overhead. I can’t see that changing.”

Dr. Allan said that over the last four decades, he has gotten to know a lot of nice people, and that he will deeply miss his patients and staff.

Bay Medical patients are encouraged to make exit appointments soon so that they can obtain enough prescription drugs and arrange to transfer their medical records to new providers. For a list of recommended providers or for any other information, please contact Bay Medical Clinic at 360/332-6327.