This blog (created in March 2011 by Lucky) is about new entrants to the Colombo Medical Faculty of the University of Ceylon (as it was then known) in June 1962. There were a total of 166 in the batch (included 11 from Peradeniya). Please address all communications to: colmedgrads1962@gmail.com. Header image: Courtesy Prof. Rohan Jayasekara, Dean, Faculty of Medicine, University of Colombo (2011 - 2014). Please use the search bar using a keyword to access what interests you
I have met her in my travels to the US and also at Reunions in Sri Lanka. She was always most welcoming and friendly with her engaging personality.
They have two daughters, Cheryl and Melanie.
Let us all join in conveying our condolences to Cyril and family.
May she Rest in Peace.
Mahendra Gonsalkorale
In our time there were only two Medical
Facuties in Sri Lanka, Colombo and Peradeniya. This article attempts to show the
growth in medical faculties in Sri Lanka. I should be most grateful to our
colleagues in Sri Lanka, especially Sanath Lamabadusuriya who is intimately
connected with Medical Education in Sri Lanka correct any errors and add
helpful comments.
The longest standing Medical School in Sri
Lanka, the Colombo Medical School, was founded on 1st June 1870 and admitted twenty-five students. They were awarded a
diploma of Licentiate in Medicine and Surgery (L.M.S.). In 1880, the School was named the Ceylon Medical College and the
L.M.S. was registered with the General Medical Council of Britain without
further examination.
Following the establishment of the University
of Ceylon by the University Ordinance of 1942, the MBBS degree and the BDS degree awarded by it were also recognized
for registration by the CMCC and the
medical school acquired university status as the Faculty of Medicine.
Subsequently, in 1978, the university act was
changed and the campuses of the University of Ceylon became regional
universities. Thus, the Faculty of Medicine became part of the University of Colombo.
Over time, more faculties of medicine were
established; at present, there are 12 medical faculties in Sri Lanka, i.e. the
medical faculties of the Universities of Colombo, Peradeniya, Jaffna, Ruhuna,
Kelaniya, Moratuwa, Sabaragamuwa, Rajarata, Wyamba, Uva Wellassa, South Eastern
and Sri Jayewardenepura.
There is
also a Faculty of Medicine in the Sir John Kotelewala Defence University in
Ratmalana.
North Colombo Medical College (NCMC) was the
first privately funded medical school in Sri Lanka. It started in 1980 with the
admission of 100 local and 20 foreign students
In
2022, about 1200 graduated from the Universities in Sri Lanka
1,961
students who sat for the A/L examination in 2019 and 14,80 students who sat the
A/L examination in 2018 had enrolled at medical faculties in the respective
years.The total number of students allowed to enroll at universities
following the 2020 A/L examination is 43,500, which is a significant
increase compared to the 12,000 students who enrolled for universities after to
2019 A/L examination.
Medical graduates from Sri Lanka have an excellent reputation, and certainly, here in the UK, they are recognised for their reliability, skill and overall excellence.
It
would be interesting to view the statistics (if available) on how many doctors
left to work abroad permanently.
13.09.2023 The following comment was made by Prof. Sanath Lamabadusuriya and as it contains valuable information, I am adding it to the main post.
Thank you very much Mahendra for documenting the history of medical education in Sri Lanka. In the early 1970s, University admissions were standardised so that Tamil students had to score more marks than the Sinhala students, to be admitted to Universities. Opposition MPs such as Gamini Dissanaike announced in Parliament that if and when they come to power, standardisation would be abolished. With JRJ's resounding victory in 1977, standardisation was abolished. Then, although Tamils formed 13% of the population, relatively and numerically more Tamils qualified for admission which was politically not palatable and more Sinhala students were admitted,so as to balance the equation. With the increased intake, the two existing faculties, Colombo and Peradeniya, could not accommodate the increased intake. Therefore two new Faculties were opened in Jaffna and Ruhuna so as to accommodate the increased intake. When the Chairs were advertised, I applied and was appointed to the Chair in Ruhuna and I assumed duties on the 1st of September 1980. I was there until I returned To Colombo in September 1991, when the Chair was advertised; on both occasions I was the only applicant!
The Peradeniya Faculty was established because the country was short of doctors, quite ironically, when the first Peradeniya batch graduated in January 1967. all of them were not offered jobs in the government sector and were given an allowance of a few hundred rupees and requested them to be attached to a GP, so as to be trained in PP. At that time, the ECFMG examination was conducted in Colombo and quite a lot of us sat for it. When I sat, about 75% of the candidates were Indians because the exam was banned in India. Our colleagues applied for jobs in the US and quite a lot when to a hospital in Coney Island in New York.
Ruhuna and Jaffna Facuties were established together in the late 1970s. The NCMC became the Kelaniya Faculty in 1991. Sri Jayawardenepura Faculty was opened in 1993..The Rajarata and Eastern University Medical Faculties were opened in July 2006.The Kotelawela Defence University Medical Faculty was opened in 2012.The Sabaragamuwa and Wayamba Medical Faculties were established in 2018, and I was invited to be the consultant for the Sabaragamuwa project. Currently, I am in Ratnapura because the SLMC has sent a team for a review prior to accreditation.
Therefore I have been closely involved with four State Medical Faculties ( Colombo -Emeritus Professor, Ruhuna-Founder Professor, Rajarata-Visiting Senior Professor since April 2015. Sabaragamuwa-Consultant and Visiting Senior Professor).
There was a Presidential directive to open Private Medical Schools.
I was invited to be the Chief Consultant to establish a Private Medical School by Lyceum and SLIIT in Malabe. The Teaching Hospital for SLIIT will be the one in N'Eliya and I will be going there tomorrow from Ratnapura. The hospitals in Rikiligaskada,Teldeniya and Dickoya would be the cluster hospitals. The Teaching Hospitals for Lyceum would be in Chilaw and at Seeduwa, at the Vijaya Kumaranatunga Hospital.
Gateway and the NSBM will also be opening Private Medical Schools in the near future.
Mahendra "Speedy" Gonsalkorale
If I pose that question by dropping the ‘l’, the answer is easy! I was tempted to write as I have been wondering for some time why our Blog is not as popular as I was hoping it would be. This view may be erroneous if we base popularity on the number of hits as nearly 890,000 is not bad for a Blog! But we must remember that this is probably not a true representation of popularity as quite a number are automatically generated by surfing robots, as I have pointed out before. These are automated mini-programs, which search Blogs hoping to dredge useful data such as emails of people. Even if for argument’s sake we regard that 50% are robotic hits, it still leaves a healthy 400,000 plus hits. But if we consider how interactive it is, by looking at numbers who comment, then we do fall short by quite a margin. The total number of persons who have commented is below 20 and of these there are less than 10 very active people.
Or is this a wider issue about how school friends or University friends keep in touch? We have moved in different directions and we have built up new friendships and we may feel a need to move on putting our past behind us, especially if that part of our past is something we want to forget. We have formed groupings within us based on where we live and our own interests. Our circles have widened and those who we consider worth keeping in touch, we still do but the criterion has to be much wider than “he/she was my batch colleague”. The bonds that we had then have to be very strong for them to survive the ravages of time. We are pleasant when we see each other, but life has taken us in different directions, and we have moved on. We may not feel the need to rekindle the relationship.The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese
A Review and Recommendation.
The indication that you have just finished reading an exceptional book is the melancholy feeling that you get when a good experience is over, such as after a relaxing vacation or a special concert. You are sad to say goodbye to the characters who have been your companions for the last few days or weeks.
‘The
Covenant of Water’ is such a book. I
decided to read it in spite of its intimidating 700+pages, because Abraham
Verghese is one of my favourite authors.
He is a physician and writer who is presently a Provostial Professor and
Vice Chair of the Department of Medicine at Stanford University.
The story, which spans about 80 years and covers 3 generations, begins in Travancore,
South India, which later becomes part of the State of Kerala. The author depicts the characters and their
surroundings with tender detail and great affection, and one can develop strong
connections; because those of us who grew up in that part of the world probably
knew people like that. The descriptions
of some of the characters will make you chuckle.
I have not visited Kerala, but people who have
travelled there remark on the similarities to Sri Lanka. There are descriptions
of hill country tea estates, beaches and villages, which are all familiar to us.
The story
is chronological and feels like short stories featuring the various characters
woven together in the narrative. There are many references to the history of
the times, the British occupation of India, World War II, the struggle for
independence, the activities of the Communist Party in Kerala and so on. It is a family saga with joyful celebrations
and heartbreaking tragedies, all described in exquisite detail with great sensitivity.
While reading this book there were times when
I felt that I was re-living my past. In
the early part of the story, in 1933, a young Scotsman recently graduated from
Medical College joins the Indian Medical Service in order to develop his skills
as a surgeon. Coming from a working-class background, he felt he didn’t have the right connections to get ahead in
his field in England. The description of
his first appointment in Madras in Longmere Hospital (a fictitious hospital)
took me back to my first appointment after my internship in Karawanella! Two crowded wards were assigned to him filled
with Indian patients, while his boss, a
Senior Civil Surgeon, looked after the almost empty ward reserved for British
and Anglo-Indian patients.
In
Karawanella, the set up was rather similar, where the DMO only allowed his
‘private’ patients to be admitted to his ward, by underlings like us. These patients had paid him a fee privately
(Illegal for a government medical officer).
We were given strict instructions not to admit any ‘floor’ patients to
his spotless ward. We didn’t always
follow the instructions, but that is another story!
Similarly,
when Verghese describes the experiences of a medical student, I was transported
in time to the formalin reeking anatomy block, and the pathology lab with
shelves stacked with specimens in glass containers.
There are
many medical details throughout the book,
because I think Dr. Verghese cannot completely shed his role of a
teacher of medicine. Perhaps it is a bit too much detail for the average
reader, but I enjoyed those sections immensely.
One does not have to be a physician to relish this book.
There
were many passages and sentences which I
read over and over again because the language and the imagery were so beautiful. (That is why I don’t enjoy listening to
audiobooks.) An example: writing about a
matriarch who relates family stories, he writes “…such memories are woven from
gossamer threads; time eats holes in the fabric, and these she must darn with
myth and fable.”
From my reading this book, I learned about the St. Thomas Christians of that
region. Their ancestors converted to
Christianity following the visit of St. Thomas, one of Jesus Christ’s
disciples, in AD 52. They are some of
the earliest Christians. There are many biblical and literary quotations in the
book, faithfully acknowledged in the notes.
I hope
some of the readers of this blog will pick up this hefty book sometime soon and start reading. It will be difficult to put it down.
Sad news of Navam Chinniah passing away.
The following note was derived from the Obituary Notice on the Abriola Parkview Funeral Home website. It was sent to me by Srainee (Bunter) Dias, who was the first to inform me.
Navam will be remembered as one of the brightest students in our Batch. He always had a very assured and confident manner, and a warm smile. He emigrated to the USA in 1968 and enjoyed a very successful career.
Obituary of Anton N. Chinniah, MD (From Abriola Parkview Funeral Home in Trumbull, CT)
Anton Chinniah, MD, age 80, of Trumbull, beloved
husband of Sriani Selviah Chinniah, passed away peacefully on Thursday, August
3, 2023 with his loving family by his side. Born in Colombo, Sri Lanka, he was
a son of the late Wilfred and Grace Jayamaha Chinniah.
Doctor Chinniah immigrated to the United States
in June 1968, starting his life in Bridgeport, CT and settling in Trumbull, CT.
He had a successful career in medicine spanning over 50 years at Bridgeport
Hospital. He had his own private practice in Bridgeport where he treated each
patient with love and compassion, always listening and giving them proper
treatment and sound advice. He worked for his community not just for himself.
He instilled these values in his children.
 |
| Navam with Indra Anandasabathy at a Party in CT, Oct 2016 |
A blend of thoughts of home and life
By Dr Nihal D Amerasekera
I remember singing the old Scout song “Row row row your boat,” which ends with that thoughtful and deeply philosophical line …… “Life is but a dream”. It didn’t seem so in my youth, but with the passage of years I see the great honesty and candour in that line.
I schooled at Wesley College in the 1950’s. Baseline road then was a busy narrow road with a steady stream of Morris Minor cabs, red Leyland buses and bullock carts, all competing for position. There were no pavements. People walked on the edge of the road with vehicles whizzing past their toes. The massive complex of the Welikada Prison hogged the landscape. There was a rather lonely road just in front of the school gates that went in the direction of Wanathamulla. It ran by the tall perimeter wall of the Prison. Every morning the prisoners wearing white were taken along this narrow road by the Guards in Khaki shorts armed with batons. Being so close to the prison for over a decade, I had often wondered how life panned out for those in jail. For many of us the prison is a dark and mysterious place for dangerous criminals. Very few knew what happened behind those grim gates that swallowed them. Time then was not a luxury but a burden to endure. None had the benefit of kindness. I just wondered how they faced the world again when they got their freedom.
My parents drilled into me from a young age that I would have to earn my own living and find my way in life. There was no inheritance to follow. On looking back, that was honest and sensible advice. This encouraged and strengthened my resolve. I worked hard at school and was amply rewarded to be selected to follow a course in medicine in Colombo. Medical education was a hard toil in a harsh environment. Just out of our teens, when my friends were enjoying life, the faculty of medicine became my gilded cage. Textbooks were my pillow at night. I was too aware of the light at the end of the tunnel. A sinister arrogance and an assured sense of entitlement crept into my personality. I dreamed of living happily ever after. It was not long before part of that charm and fantasy began to wear thin.
In the fullness of time, I stepped on the treadmill to carve myself a career. My first pay as a doctor in the mid-1960’s was Rs 450.00. This seemed like a small fortune at the time. It paid for my ‘extravagant lifestyle’. Within a few months, I saved enough money to buy a Seiko Watch, a symbol of opulence and elegance. It took a few more months saving to buy a radio. These were luxuries during the stifling import restrictions of the 1960’s. For seven long years I enjoyed immensely working for the Health Service. Professionally I was simply adrift with the wind. What I remember mostly of those years are of the simple and kindly rural folk of the wanni, who were my patients. They were so very grateful for the little I could do to help them.
Being an only child, it was my desire to live and work in Sri Lanka and care for my parents. By a wicked twist of fortune, the turbulence and trouble in my personal life made me want to leave the country for a new beginning. The prevailing political turmoil and our sagging economy did not give us much faith or hope for the future. Further education and qualification seemed just like an impossible dream. Many professionals dispersed far and wide in search of work and opportunity. After much thought and soul searching, I followed the herd and left the country. From then on, there was the Darwinian struggle of survival of the fittest. Amidst the fierce competition for the plum jobs, there were the many unwanted prejudices to contend with. Despite all that, life was more stable and predictable. There was a new energy and a joyous appreciation of the status quo. Finally, I found that all-important professional pride and satisfaction. With secure employment, marriage and caring for my family took precedence. I embraced and adored everything parenthood had to offer. Time passed swiftly and relentlessly.
Inspiration for life comes from various sources. Although I remain an agnostic, different religions and philosophies, have given me a fine platform for thought. They have helped me to find a path to tread. This apparent indifference to religion is not due to a reckless lack of respect for values and beliefs. We all need to be guided by a religion or a philosophy. A personal philosophy may not save the world but will help one to lead a meaningful life. I still remain immensely grateful for my Christian upbringing.
Retirement has given me time to think about life, its highs, lows, and its vagaries. The idealism of my early years is now long gone. The emotional climate has grown calmer. Spending a lifetime in medicine has the drawback of allowing hypochondriacal tendencies to surface. I need some lotions and portions to tidy up my health. We all learn to deal with these issues effectively. Now is the time to celebrate our achievements and be happy with what we have.
Sometimes, as the night falls and peace descends on my world, there is a wish to turn back the clock. Those early years spent with my parents and grandparents were a rich gift. Their presence in my thoughts brings me great joy and warmth. Although they have all now left this world their memory remains very much alive. Thoughts of my old school and friends brings me great pleasure. There is also sadness for those departed. At times there is a desire to walk the corridors of my old school and step into those classrooms. On those special evenings I often visit the General Hospital Colombo of the 1960’s where I learnt my trade to see the progress and the regress since those days of long ago. Without that burning ambition and the relentless chase for knowledge, the journey back is nostalgic, fascinating, and a lot of fun.
I have now lived in England for 50 years. Regent’s Park with its lakes and gardens is a short walk away. My daily walks bring me increasingly closer to nature. The summer sunshine and the winter storms have their own splendour. I have watched the birds migrate and return with the changing seasons, bringing up their young with such tenderness. I listen to the language of the flowers as I walk past the colourful blossoms. It’s a haven for bees and butterflies. Even the squirrels and blackbirds seem to know me now as the man who feeds them peanuts.
All through my years I have enjoyed reading books. Now it is too much of a long-term commitment. I wish to be outdoors or to do things in short bursts. I read the newspapers online and communicate with friends on social media. At this time in my life nothing inspires me more than the calmness of classical music. There is music for every mood and occasion. I have always been mesmerised by the crimson glow of the sunsets that I have witnessed around the world. The combination of the sun, the clouds and their reflection on the water gives the sunset such a magical status. The music composed by Massenet – Meditation from Thaïs, transports me to those pristine sunsets and brings peace to my soul.
Cricket has cemented my love affair with London. This has been my passion all my life. Watching cricket at Lords brings me great joy. While seated in the ‘home of cricket’ there are times when my mind wanders across the vast swathes of land and oceans to where I spent my childhood. The enchantment of those cricket matches of my youth still haunts me. The fizz and excitement of school cricket was infectious. Singing and chanting, I have watched the game under the “Mara” trees at Campbell Park. The picturesque breezy grounds at St Thomas’ Mt Lavinia was a paradise for spinners. The lush green turf with that quaint pavilion, Royal College have hosted some of the finest games I’ve watched. At St Joseph’s, Darley Road the Gothic columns of the domed chapel provided a fine backdrop for the spectators. While seated on the terraced lawn at St Peter’s Bambalapitiya I could smell the canal and see the smoke from the endlessly spewing chimneys of the Wellawatte Spinning and Weaving mills. These are thoughts and images I have cherished all my life.
Leaving the country of my birth has left me with many scars and regrets. Losing much of the rich Sri Lankan culture, music and language is often hard to bear. I am now a stranger to the new generation that has grown up in my absence. Even to my family and friends so much has happened to our lives since I left Sri Lanka, it is now impossible to match the closeness we once enjoyed. Above all not being with my parents at their hour of need still brings me great sadness that is hard to console. I have paid a heavy price for my professional ambitions and achievements.
As I look out of the window on
this summer’s day in London, I see the rain beating on the glass panes of my
window. I acquired my most vivid childhood memory as a five-year-old, looking
through my bedroom window in Bogawantalawa and seeing the monsoon rain
transform a road into a river. Although so much has happened in between, time
has flown amazingly quickly. I seek the wisdom of that great Roman poet Horace:
… dum loquimur, fugerit invida
Aetas: carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero.
(As we speak, envious time is
fleeing. Seize the day, putting as little trust as possible in tomorrow.)
