Message From President

I feel it a great privilege and honor to be elected your president for the two year term 2019 to 2020. I am very thankful for the trust you have all placed with me with this office.

Texas Nepalese Medical Association was established in September, 2018 with the goal of providing free health care, providing education on health related topics and uniting the medical, nursing and allied health personnel under one common platform.

With the growing medical community presence in Dallas / Fort Worth it was felt necessary to have a more active medical society that enables us to interact with one another in a congenial social environment. It was also imperative for us to have a cohesive medical community where we could all work together in harmony to pursue our common goal of “working together for a healthy community”.

Nepalese Society of Texas (NST) in association with physicians of Texas Nepalese Medical Association (TNMA) has been doing free Medical and Dental Camps in Irving, Texas since 2009. During these free Health Camps, free medical and dental check ups were provided and basic screening labs were offered at heavily subsidized cost. Flu shots were provided during flu season and free EKG’s were also done. I am very grateful to Nepalese Society of Texas for fully funding these Health Camps.

After the devastating earthquake of April, 2015 in Nepal, two medical teams from Nepalese Society of Texas and Texas Nepalese Medical Association doctors and dentists were in Nepal helping the earthquake victims. The first medical team went out within a week of the earthquake in May 2015 and went to remote areas in Sindhupalchok and Nuwakot district taking care of patients affected by the devastating earthquake. The second NST team with TNMA and international physicians went out in June 2015 and attended to over two thousand patients over ten days.

There is also a growing diaspora of Nepalese population in Dallas/Fort Worth now almost reaching 40,000. It was felt that a transition from Health Camps to a permanent Health Clinic was needed. There is an acute need for a health clinic where Nepalese community members, especially our parents, uncles, aunts and grandparents can get care and help to access the complex medical system in US. Our older community members often have language barrier and do not speak English fluently and it is comforting to be able to interact with doctors and nurses in Nepali. It is the goal of TNMA to eventually establish a community health clinic where the elderly, uninsured and under insured community members can get subsidized medical care. The logistics of establishing a permanent Health Clinic is fraught with complex rules and regulations of the US health care system and it also requires significant funding. With these above objectives in mind TNMA is undertaking a fund raising dinner.

It is said charity begins at home and I feel that Texas is now home for most of us. We are now all bound to this land through our children as this is where most of them were borne and will live. Many of us were borne in Nepal “Janma bhoomi” but will live out our days in dear Texas “Karma bhoomi”. This is why I strongly feel that we should strive to set up a community health clinic in Eu-less/Irving.

In terms of the medical community TNMA will be a platform to bring all the doctors, dentists together is a cohesive, communal and cordial environment. TNMA also welcomes all other medical personnel like nurse practitioners, nurses, pharmacists, dietitians and social service workers to join TNMA for we need a team to run a successful clinic. TNMA will also guide and help cultivate leadership qualities in our medical students as they face their careers ahead. TNMA will be a source of knowledge for incoming international medical graduates. Hand in hand we want to work together to unite all the medical diaspora and be a conduit for bringing everybody together for the common cause “working together for a healthy community”

I am glad to say that we now have over fifty active members to help us meet our goals.

Lastly, we are working diligently to organize our internet site www.tnmaonline.org to make it an effective tool for us to co communicate with each other, get information about health care changes and also be a  source of information on local business which support and provide medical and business needs in our community. We would like to see the TNMA site develop into a source of information hub for incoming new physicians to be able to connect with local business and also for patients to get quick detailed information on physicians and other medical services and facilities available in the community. We will have a section “circle of sponsors” which will list businesses that sponsor and support Texas Nepalese Medical Association in our mission.

I would like to specially thank TNMA Executive Board members and administrative Directors who have put in countless hours to make our common goal a reality. Finally allow me please to seek your continued support and cooperation to make Texas Nepalese Medial Society truly purpose and meaningful to all of us in the years ahead.

Thanking you all and looking forward to a wonderful year ahead.

Respectfully,

Sanjeeb Shrestha, MD, FACG

President, Texas Nepalese Medical Society

Fort Worth, Texas