When Dr. Steve Allen and his wife, nurse Cindy Allen, opened Internists Associated in Muncie 40 years ago this month, they were like a lot of small business owners. They wanted to be their own bosses. They wanted to build something special for themselves and their young family.
But they didn’t envision the new family they would create behind their practice doors.
That has been the happy side effect of four decades in business in the same location. In that time, doctors and nurses and staff members have come and gone while others have stayed from the start. Dr. Allen has retired while his daughter, Dr. Megan Zelasko, who once ran the halls as a little girl, has joined the practice and plans to run it herself someday.
But all those people contributed to IA as it is today. Medicine has never been an easy profession to pursue—and with all the changes 40 years have brought, it certainly hasn’t gotten easier. But kind coworkers with a shared vision of caring for their community have made all the ups and downs worthwhile, and now the practice is marking its anniversary at a high point in its history.
“It has taken 40 years,” says Dr. Allen, “but we have the best staff we have ever had.”
The Allens recently closed up shop early and invited staff to a party with ice cream and cake, games and a bounce house, time spent together in the summer sunshine—a real family celebration.
