Loseling Clinic, which was
earlier known as ‘Loseling Dispensary,’ was established in 1984 primarily to
provide free First Aid and general medicine to the young students of Drepung
Loseling School. The medical service later expanded to include Loseling’s elder
monks and then finally to all the monks and laypeople of this area. We offered
half-price medications and basic treatments needed for everyone who came to us.
Though we underwent hardships and financial crises during all those years, we
survived with the kind support of generous people.
There
has been a rapid increase in number of inhabitants at Mundgod, the poor rural
area where Loseling is located. The population of Loseling Monastery was less
than 500 monks in 1984. Over past 20 years it has grown to more than 2500 monks
currently. Though we have many monks from the Himalaya regions as well as from
Nepal, Bhutan and Tibetan communities in India, most of them are new arrivals
from Tibet. Many of the monks have not had vaccinations or access to good medical
facilities.
There
were lots of problems for ailing patients such as the amount of time, financial
costs and the language barrier when they went out of the monastery for the
standard diagnosis and treatment. As a result, Drepung Loseling monastery expanded
its dispensary into a full-fledged clinic which could provide treatment for
patients using sophisticated medical equipment. This new Loseling clinic was
inaugurated by His Holiness the Dalai Lama on December 9, 2002.
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