North West District’s more than 250 community programmes have helped over 600,000 residents

SINGAPORE – Realising that elderly patients without stable family support had worse health outcomes, a group of medical students decided to start a home visit initiative in 2014.

Yet when Tri-Generational Homecare (TriGen) was first started, few took the medical students seriously or were keen to sign up to volunteer, co-founder Kennedy Ng told The Straits Times on Friday.

It was only with the help of the North West Community Development Council (CDC) that the project was able to get principals of some secondary schools in the north on board and let their students get involved.

TriGen is so named because it aims to bring three generations together: youth, young adults (including doctors, nurses, physiotherapists and social workers), and elderly patients recently discharged from hospitals.

Aside from providing up to $10,000 of funding a year, Dr Ng, 32, who is now a medical oncologist, said of the CDC’s involvement: “The most important thing the CDC did was that they believed that we could do something and we could do something together.”

The initiative, which is almost 10 years old, has helped 192 elderly people and seen 717 student volunteers get involved to date.

The group’s current project director, Ms Thangaraja Keerthana, 21, told ST: “Just having an organisation that believes in our vision and has been supporting us throughout these years – it really helps us.”

TriGen was one of about 257 volunteer-initiated programmes that were celebrated by the North West CDC during its North West District Meeting 2023 held at the Flower Dome at Gardens by the Bay on Friday evening.

The programmes that were lauded include social assistance programmes, upskilling opportunities and health and wellness programmes. Together, they have impacted the lives of more than 600,000 residents in the last three years, said the district.

The CDC also runs programmes to encourage sustainable living in the community.

For instance, Nee Soon South’s green champion, Mr Ng Hak Hai, encourages residents to get involved in sustainability initiatives in the community.

One of the programmes he highlighted was a clothes collection drive and swop initiated by Republic Polytechnic students. For Father’s Day, the volunteers invited children who live in rental flats to collect clothes for free for their parents, said Mr Ng, 61.

“They choose the items for their parents, so it becomes more meaningful as the parents are happy their kids chose for them,” said the product manager at a semiconductor company.

Mr Ng, who became Nee Soon South’s green champion in 2012, added that he is pleased that the programme is largely run by young people working together with the CDC.

The North West District Meeting, held once every three years, was hosted by Mayor of North West District and MP for Marsiling-Yew Tee GRC Alex Yam.

Also present were CDC vice-chairmen Lim Wee Kiak and Carrie Tan, as well as MPs Edward Chia (Holland-Bukit Timah GRC) and Derrick Goh (Nee Soon GRC), and Sembawang GRC MPs Vikram Nair and Mariam Jaafar.

Mr Yam agreed that it was important for partners and volunteers to work together to improve the lives of North West residents.

“We have seen first-hand how the community’s spirit of care shines through in the toughest times,” he said.

“While the CDC has spearheaded the rollout of several assistance programmes and bonding activities to engage a wide spectrum of residents, many were made possible by our strong network of partners and volunteers who came together to contribute their resources to serve the North West community.”