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Twin Towers of Healing
by Dr. A.N. Safaya
DESIRE
TO HAVE KNOWLEDGE
about
the Divine and its
manifestations
including
the phenomenon of
life in the living has been in the human mind since the
beginning of human intellectual evolution. Along side it, there
has been the urge for the practice of the art of healing the
afflictions and injuries of the human
form.
The two have been together
since eternity. The Vedas, which present the most ancient
documentation on spirituality, amply exemplify the togetherness
of thoughts on Divinity and the art of healing.
The Principles of Arogya
It is therefore but natural that Bhagavan Baba emphasised the
importance of human body and mind remaining in a state of good
health to achieve the desired results when He initiated the Sai
Seva Mission for the service of mankind. Advocating the
importance of the awareness of Divinity and the practice
of
the
principles
of
spirituality, He
emphasises the need for
the
prevention
of bad health and avoiding
unhealthy personal hygiene and unhealthy
lifestyle. Every now and then, Bhagavan keeps
on laying stress on the observance of good and healthy
principles of personal hygiene, food, nutrition, and healthy
lifestyle.
Bhagavan advocates the golden principles of Arogya (absence of
ill health). Seva Dal volunteers of Sri Sathya Sai Samithis all
over the country are spreading the awareness of these principles
effectively and diligently. Under this programme of awareness,
society is going on a
steady march, at grass root level, towards a state of
positive health for its
members. This is how Sai Health Mission took its first step
towards Arogya with the message that it was the foremost duty of
man to keep his body healthy.
Sri Sathya Sai General Hospitals
The second
step in the
direction of
treatment of disease, once
it had occurred, was
the establishment
of two Sri Sathya Sai General Hospitals, one at Prasanthi
Nilayam and other at Whitefield, Bangalore. These two general
hospitals look after the patients of all general ailments,
conduct tests, give treatment, drugs and do surgical
interventions
completely
free of charge.
Nearly one crore patients have been
benefited by the services
of these two hospitals since their inception years ago.
Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher
Medical
Sciences, Prasanthi Nilayam
The third step was to establish the twin towers of Sai Health
Mission in the form of two Sri Sathya Sai Institutes of Higher
Medical Sciences-one in Puttaparthi, Andhra Pradesh and the
other at Whitefield, Karnataka.
On the occasion of
His Birthday on 23rd
November 1990,
Bhagavan made a momentous declaration of
establishing a Super
Speciality Hospital in Puttaparthi for highly specialised
treatment of diseases of heart, kidney and eyes. As a
consequence
of
this
Divine
Sankalpa of
Bhagavan, Institute
of Higher Medical Sciences was conceptualised, planned and built
in a record time of six months. It was inaugurated by the
then
Prime
Minister of India,
Sri P.V. Narasimha Rao on 22nd November
1991 and started
functioning fully from that day. It has never looked back.
Established in an
architecturally and
aesthetically beautiful building, which sits majestically
in the centre of its sprawling lush green lawns, it lodges
the
specialities
of
cardiology,
cardio-thoracic
surgery, urology, ophthalmology, anaesthesiology, laboratory
medicine, blood bank, bio-medical and general engineering
services.
The staff
working
in
these departments is
hand picked, well chosen with care and dedicated to the service
of ailing patients. The equipment used in diagnosis and
treatment of the patients is the latest and state of the art.
All the parameters of functioning of the Super Speciality
Hospital in all its branches are highly satisfactory and of
international standard. It is highly popular, well renowned and
well known all over the world, and is open for treatment to all,
irrespective of the distinction of caste, creed, colour,
religion or country. All
the diagnostic investigations, laboratory tests and the
treatment including surgery are done completely free of cost to
one and all, rich and poor!
Service with Love and Humility
All this workload is shouldered by the hospital creditably and
completely free of cost to the enormous number of patients it
has served so far. All the treatment is given by the dedicated
staff of doctors, nurses and technicians to each and every
patient with
humility and love, amidst spiritual environment, with the name
of God on their lips. The hospital
maintains very high standard of cleanliness, purity and
discipline with the help of nearly 100 Seva Dal volunteers
working round the clock.
Seva Dal volunteers are the dedicated devotees of Bhagavan Sri
Sathya Sai Baba and come by turn from every State of the country
under a laid down scheduled programme. They dedicate their Seva
at the Divine Feet of Bhagavan Baba and work in the hospital in
honorary capacity for varied intervals of time of few days to
few weeks or months. This is an
excellent example of
community participation in the healthcare
programme. Middle level management and the
care of the equipment including its preventive maintenance is
done by a group of Technical Officers who are highly
skilled graduates and postgraduates from Sri Sathya Sai
Institute of Higher Learning, a deemed university. Their
dedication and diligence is responsible for nearly
100 per cent uptime of
all the equipment of the Institute. This Institute of excellence
has developed within typical rural environment and has been
functioning in a purely rurai setting since its inception. Of
course, now an airport and a railway station have come up in
close proximity, a great boon for the patients and their
attendants. Patients of concerned specialities come from all
over the country and are examined fully. Urgent cases are given
prompt medical attention and those who can wait are put on
waiting list and are called when their turn comes. Attendants of
patients have a dormitory facility with a canteen attached.
Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher
Medical
Sciences, Whitefield
Bhagavan's infinite love and compassion for the suffering masses
concretised in the establishment of yet another Super Speciality
Hospital at Whitefield, Bangalore. It is, in fact, a second Sri
Sathya Sai Institute of
Higher Medical Sciences. The Institute was inaugurated by the
then Prime Minister of India, Sri Atal Bihari Vajpayee on 19th
January 2001. It is functional since then. The Institute is
situated in a fully developed urban-cum-industrial setting, in
fact, next door neighbour being the world famous
International Technology
Park. The palace-like architecture of the huge hospital
building is breathtakingly impressive. This white brilliant
jewel of a building sits pretty in the emerald green lawns
surrounding it. It lodges the super specialities of cardiac
sciences and neurosciences with all of their necessary support
services. It has a bed strength of 333 which is looked after by
highly dedicated, well qualified and
experienced staff.
Like the Institute of
Higher Medical
Sciences at Prasanthi
Nilayam, this Institute also gives international standard
treatment to its patients for the diseases of heart and brain
completely free of charge. Patients are served by the staff,
doctors, nurses and technicians with love, understanding and
sympathy in keeping with Bhagavan's principles of loving
selfless
service.
The hospital is equipped with latest,
state-of-the-art equipment; some of the systems for
diagnosis and treatment are made available to patients for
the first time in the country. A bigger team of Technical
Officers keeps the equipment of the hospital in a state of
perfect functioning at all times with practically no down
time. They are
supported by
the
Biomedical
and General Engineering
Departments. Though not connected directly with the
treatment of patients, the workers of the
support
departments have
thorough technical experience and knowledge to keep
the hospital
infrastructure
and support
services in ideal state of functioning in a manner which
should serve as a model to other hospitals of the country.
The data and the indices of patient
care
are comparable
to the data
available
from any
other hospital
at international level.
Patient Counselling Service
A unique
feature in the patient care process of the two
Institutes is the Patient Counselling Service. This service
has been introduced as a model project in Super
Speciality
Hospital at
Whitefietd. The
consultants of the treating department of the Institute keep
the patient under health surveillance after he is discharged
from the hospital with the help of the volunteers of Sai
Organisation.
The counselling activities cover all the
three phases of the hospital-patient contact period, that
is, the pre-hospital phase, the hospital phase for which the
patient is admitted for surgery or treatment and the
post-hospital phase after discharge of the patient from the
hospital. This arrangement ensures that the counselling
continues at the locality of the patient's residence also.
Counselling to every patient also includes spiritual
counseling and offering
suggestions on issues like faith, prayer, meditation
and control of emotional stress, etc. Such a comprehensive
counselling care is not only disease and person specific but
is also holistic, and amounts to almost emotional adoption
of the patient with a firm promise of help for his ailment.
This is a distinct feature of the functioning of Sai Health
Mission. The system is
in operation in the State of Karnataka at present and
is in the process of being extended to all other States of
the country.
Our
country has
incomparably
large population and has equally huge incidence of disease
and ill health. We have no illusion that these Twin Towers
of Healing will treat all the patients of the diseases of
heart, brain, kidney and eyes and will wipe the tears of all
suffering patient population. No, it will help only a few -
a drop in a big ocean! But, these two Towers of Healing will
serve as models for establishing such Institutes all over
the country and all over the world. Such centres
will
provide
state-of-the-art
medical
treatment through dedicated staff with love, understanding
and compassion, free of cost and without any restriction of
caste, creed, colour and country, like these two
Institutes
provide to every
patient
everyday.
Sourced: Sanathana Sarathi Pgs 332-336 November
2005 Special Edition
Courtesy:
http://worldnet24.tripod.com/articles/healing-twins.htm |
