45 nurses enter service at Nawaloka Hospital

45 nurses took the ‘Florence Nightingale Pledge’ last week as a part of the 27th anniversary celebrations of Sri Lanka’s private healthcare pioneer Nawaloka Hospital. The pledge was taken by nurses who had completed their first year of training.

The Nawaloka Hospital Nursing School currently comprises about 200 trainee nurses, all in either their first, second or third year of study. The nursing school, which was also inaugurated in 1985, admits about 50 students twice a year, according to its Principal Soma Ratnayake.

In addition, 42 loyal staff members who had served at Nawaloka Hospital for the past 25 years were awarded ‘25 years of service’ medals. These medals were awarded by Health and Nutrition Minister Maithripala Sirisena, and members of the Nawaloka Hospital Board, namely Rienzie Wijetillake, Tilak de Zoysa, Tissa Bandaranayake, and Dr. T. Senthilverl. These 42 staff members joined a further 116 who have, to date, served the hospital with dedication for 25 or more years.

This year’s 27th anniversary celebrations also feature discounts of 10% on dental and lab services and 5% on mammograms, LASIK screenings and DEXA bone density scans as a reward to customers for their many years of patronage. Discounts are available from now, until the end of September 2012.

With more than 400 beds and 600 visiting medical consultants, Nawaloka Hospital is the largest local private hospital in a single location and the country’s first fully fledged private healthcare institution, opened in 1985 with only 100 beds. The hospital was responsible for the wellbeing of over 1.5 million patients in total during the 2011/2012 period, during which it also carried out close to 15,000 surgeries.