President's Messages
It’s an honor and a privilege to be selected as the president of the second oldest association formed by the medical professionals in the country. It was founded as the Galle Clinical Society in 1940, evolved as the Galle Medical Association (GMA) and has gained its current standards as one of the most prestigious associations year by year over the last 77 years. I salute all the past presidents and the council members for their tremendous contribution towards betterment of the association and with the support of the current executive committee, I promise to maintain the good standards and if possible add more colour during my tenure in 2018.
GMA membership is getting expanded over the years reaching 400 life members and 50 - 70 annual members in each year. Membership includes the doctors of the health ministry and the university staff, general practitioners and dental doctors.
In order to address the relevant categories, the GMA committee has been expanded incorporating members from the GP association, dental doctor association and doctors representing subspecialties.
GMA has a solid academic program throughout the year focusing both post graduate and non-postgraduate doctors to improve the knowledge and the professionalism in the form of workshops in collaboration with collage of physicians, cardiologists etc. and a series of CME lectures on monthly basis. This year Annual Academic Sessions, the most awaited event of our calendar will be held from 10th - 12th October 2018 with the hope of offering the maximum benefit to the membership.
The annual GMA long trip, the most attractive out of all the social activities, has been scheduled in mid June. Expanding the knowledge of our members beyond the horizons of the medical field, a series of non-medical lectures by the veterans of various fields has been lined up too. As I strongly believe that indulging with some kind of art will mold a balanced person out of a doctor who is burnt out due to the heavy workload, certain items have been incorporated in to our year planner. We have already started showing world famous, well reputed films in our "Night Theatre" fortnightly at the GMA lecture theatre. To bring up the hidden talents of the doctors, we wish to provide them a platform by means of offering a place to display their art work in the library premises and in the newsletter. There will be many more activities and any suggestions will be warmly welcomed with regard to this matter.
Students verses staff cricket match and the "six aside "doctors cricket tournament are the sports activities planned for the year.
To encourage the membership to involve more with research work, GMA has started offering two research grants during the tenure of Dr. Satish Goonesinghe. We expanded this further by providing a "Research Help Desk" to discuss the practical problems with the experts in the field.
GMA has been conducting regular CPR programmes in collaboration with the Collage of Anaesthesiologists, for the doctors working in the Southern Province for more than 10 yrs. We hope to expand this service to the community as a "Basic Life Support" course during this year. The GMA website - www.gma.lk , has been already launched and all the academic and social events will be uploaded well ahead. We cordially invite you to communicate with us via the website and give us a feedback regarding the activities we hold.
During the tenure of the former president Dr. Satish Goonesinghe, the standards of the GMA library has been uplifted by refurbishing and upgrading the facilities hence became very helpful in getting through the exams for the junior doctors. It was decided to make it available only for the GMA members and the opening time has expanded from 8am to 5pm.
I wish to thank the outgoing president Dr. Sarath Kularatna, council members and the administrative secretaries for their tireless efforts and to warmly welcome the new council members with whom I will tie my hands to do the best to the Association and the membership during the year 2018.
Dr. Kesharie De Silva
President – 2018
