Dr.D.C.Ambalavanar's Message:

Many Tamils living outside Sri Lanka have a great interest in being of service to their community in their homeland. What is especially heartening is that these are not just those who left Sri Lanka for various reasons and thus have a natural connection to this place but many of the next generation of Tamils (many born abroad) who have shown a similar interest and commitment.

A good example of the latter is Dr.Ahilan Sivaganesan who was born in the USA and is currently a senior resident in Neurosurgery in the Vanderbilt Medical Centre and is a graduate of Baylor School of Medicine. He became involved and interested after joining the International Medical Health Organisation in the USA which is a charity set up by Tamil medics. He made a short visit in 2017 to Jaffna when he saw for himself the needs particularly with regard to Neurosurgery.The Northern Province has been without a neurosurgeon for over a year causing considerable hardships to the community. This is particularly so for patients who suffer head trauma which is a regular occurrence especially due to Road traffic accidents. The junior medical staff in the neurosurgery unit at the Teaching Hospital, Jaffna deals with these as best they can but find it difficult when faced with complex situations and when children suffer head trauma. On average around four patients are transferred every month from Jaffna alone to the neurosurgery unit in Colombo. There are others transferred directly from the northern mainland hospitals as well.

Understanding this situation Ahilan very kindly offered to come and spend a week in Jaffna to provide some training for doctors and nurses in the  fundamentals of managing head injury patients. He came self-funded and sacrificed a week of his own precious leave to do so.The Department of Surgery of the Faculty of Medicine helped coordinate his visit both at the Teaching Hospital and in the Provincial Ministry hospitals. The Provincial Director, Regional Directors of Health, hospital directors and consultants were all very cooperative in this.Ahilan had a very busy week indeed while here. Directly off the train he did lectures for the Final Year medical students covering the important topics in neurosurgery for them. During the week he did lectures for doctors and nurses from Vavuniya ,Mannar,Mullaitivu and Kilinochchi districts in the Vavuniya and Kilinochci General Hospitals as well as in Jaffna for nurses and doctors from Tellipallai, Point Pedro, Chavakachcheri and Kayts hospitals. Finally he also did this for staff in the Teaching Hospital.

There was very positive feedback from his talks. He kept things simple but effective. He stressed the importance of how even without surgical intervention there were simple but effective resuscitatory measures that could be carried out by doctors and nurses to significantly reduce the morbidity and mortality in head injury patients. It is highly likely that his effective message will improve outcomes. In the meantime efforts continue to persuade the central Ministry of Health to appoint a neurosurgeon to Jaffna as soon as possible.Ahilan’s visit was another example of the effective way in which committed expats interested in making a contribution can do so and we greatly appreciate his interest and commitment and look forward to more visits.

It should be mentioned in relation to the above that the main hospitals in the northern mainland had difficulty when transferring serious head injury patients to Jaffna or Colombo especially when these patients had to be ventilated.This was because the ambulances did not have transport ventilators.Thanks to the generosity of IMHO USA and the Australian Medical Aid Foundation (AMAF) ventilators have now been delivered to Mullaitivu, Kilinochchi and Vavuniya hospitals which should help improve outcomes for  head injury and other critically ill patients requiring transfer. This is further evidence of the positive contribution being made by Tamil expats to healthcare in the north.

Dr.D.C.Ambalavanar