New Vrundavan Hospital at La Campala Colony all set to treat patients like VIPs…and the return of the popular Vrundavan Health Quiz this Saturday, January 21 at the Institute Menezes. In the picture are (left) Dr Digambar Kamat with Subhash Kauthankar (CEO, New Vrundavan hospital at La- Campala Colony)

I KNOW Dr Digambar Kamat to be one of our most gregarious doctors and am happy his All Goa Vrundavan Health Quiz Competition is back at the Institute Menezes Braganza Hall in Panaji on Saturday, January 21, 2023. According to this good doctor, who has some amazing repertoire of medical stories to tell, this time they are back with 60 Higher Secondary Schools of Goa participating and anyone can come and be audience…be there by 10am if you wish although the finals of the Vrundavan Health Quiz will start at 1pm in the same hall. The quiz, he says is now KBC-styled except there is no prize money involved, only trophies!
Speaking to media people at a press conference recently, he said a lot of hard work has gone into the designing of this health and medicine-based quiz and in the past it had been popular, he sets the questions himself. This is in fact the 13th quiz in the series and they were reviving it seeing how his new baby, the New Vrundavan Medical and Research Centre and hospital is all set and ready for patients. It is equipped with some state-of-the art equipment with a roster of consulting doctors, and a pharmacy attached.
The hospital is a refurbished property at Campal Colony, Miramar – the New Vrundavan Hospital (near where Magsons Tower now stands) is designed along patient-friendly lines and has 30 rooms for in-house patients on the third floor. OPDs take place in the mornings as per appointments with doctors and specialists. I’m interested in the Vrundavan Home Hospital services they’re offering for this is much needed in our times when seniors find it traumatic to visit crowded hospitals. New Vrundavan is a private hospital of course.
But to stay with the return of the Vrundavan Health Quiz 2023, Dr Digambar rued the fact that patients and lay public as a rule are so ignorant about their health and how the human body works to be healthy – it is always useful to be an aware and educated patient, especially when it comes to medical matters. The quiz hopes to fill in some gaps in this respect by way of catching young citizens interest, so that they take an interest in their own health. Seeing how eating habits are going for a toss in today’s stressed out and forever on the run lifestyles…sooner or later the kind of health problems we see in the young are inevitable, and these are so avoidable given some knowledge and effort to better lifestyle habits in one’s own interests.
This is one of a kind medical science quiz and I hope it drums up more and more response, support and sponsors. Chief guests for the inaugural return of the Vrundavan Health Quiz on January 21 are Dr Vivek B Kamat (director, DTE), Rajesh Dempo (managing director of Dempo Vision Group) and Dasharath Parab (chairman, IMB) who is a special invitee. Needless to say I am all for health education in a myriad ways! Health is freedom is happiness and if we don’t take an interest in our own health who will? We are our own worst enemies when it comes to health and all other life is determined by it, no?
ON that note it’s avjo, selamat datang, poite verem, au revoir, arrivedecci, hasta la vista and vachun yeta here for now.

—Mme Butterfly