Starting from 88 ambulances in two provinces we have grown to a 24-hours emergency medical service with 297 ambulances that covers the entire island, with an 1390+ member passionate team. This is our story.
Since 2016 it has been our mission to prevent accidents, disease, and emergency situations, to rescue and assist people in emergencies quickly and competently, and to rehabilitate people after illness and injury.
Our journey began with a desire to deliver high-quality prehospital emergency healthcare to people across the island. In 2015, Hon. (Dr.) Harsha De Silva; the Deputy Minister of National Policies and Economic Affairs presented the Prime Minister with a proposal for a modern emergency medical service with an ambulance network. With the support of a generous grant from the government of the Republic of India, the very first 1990 ambulance was launched in Hambantota on July 27, 2016. Over a short period of time and multiple challenges and hurdles to overcome, the “1990 Suwa Seriya” free ambulance service has become a proud pioneer in Sri Lanka as a one-of-a-kind emergency medical service that covers the entire country.
Our state-of-the-art systems rely on our hard-working and systemized teams and high-powered technology to provide you with the best and fastest assistance. A combination of GPS data and Google traffic integrated and monitoring of call-to-wheel time targets ensure that the fastest ambulance meets you at the location of the emergency. Our trained EMTs will assist you based on the real-time advice of our on-call doctors from the Sri Lanka Society of Critical care and Emergency Medicine. On their advice, the patient will be transported to the nearest and most suitable hospital.
But our services do not end upon delivering you to the care of the hospital. Our teams also implement a follow-up procedure within 48 hours of the emergency. For your safety and convenience, our call centers are also aligned with the 119 Police emergency center, ensuring that you receive police assistance at the scene of the emergency in addition to our emergency medical assistance.
The 1990 Suwa Seriya service was designed to serve Sri Lanka with free one-of-a-kind emergency medical assistance. You can reach our services via telephone or through the Suwa Seriya app which has been designed to include the Sinhala, English, and Tamil languages across a user-friendly interface. The app has also been designed to allow you to contact us in situations where you have limited/no network or no/low call credit through a free of a charge phone call. The app becomes active only in Sri Lanka, thus making it an easy to use and safe option for tourists to use as well.
