Vidya Jayawardena, MD, SGU ’93, received the Ernest Bors Award for Scientific Development for her work on Bacteriuria in Neurogenic Bladder and its significance in spinal cord injury. This award for original research is sponsored by the American Paraplegia Society (APS) and honours Ernest Bors’s lifelong commitment to spinal cord injury and research.
Dr Jayawardena’s submission was chosen from over 200 submissions published in the Journal of Spinal Cord Medicine. A staff physician in the Hunter Holmes McGuire VA Hospital and Assistant Professor in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University, Dr. Jayawardena has been working in the spinal cord injury field since the summer of 2000.
At the 2002 APS meeting, Dr Jayawardena presented research on the significance of Bacteriuria in Neurogenic Bladder. In 2003, she discussed her work on preventing pressure ulcers via kinematic global positioning system technology, and in 2004, she delivered a poster presentation on preventing spinal cord injury using an electronic garment.
Dr. Jayawardena enrolled in the North Colombo Medical School in the late 1980s to fulfill her childhood dream of becoming a physician, but continuing civil unrest forced her medical school to close. St. George’s University, working with representatives of the Sri Lankan Government, worked out an agreement whereby advanced standing and some scholarship monies were granted to qualified students. Dr. Jayawardena was one of these students.
