Student-authored expressions of gratitude as an alternative approach to ceremonial body donor commemoration: An experience from a New Sri Lankan Medical Faculty.

The sustainability of body donation programs is contingent not only on cultural and religious frameworks that motivate altruistic giving, but also on the institutional practices that honor donors and maintain public trust. In Sri Lanka, Theravada Buddhist principles of dana (generosity) and karuna (compassion) underpin a well-established culture of body donation. The formal memorial ceremonies have served as the conventional expression of institutional gratitude to body donors. The Faculty of Medicine (FOM) at Wayamba University of Sri Lanka (WUSL), however, faced successive and compounding adversities following its inaugural student intake in 2018-including the Easter Sunday terrorist attack (2019), the COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2022), and a national economic crisis (2022-2023)-that rendered formal ceremonial commemoration logistically and practically unfeasible. In response, the corresponding author implemented an alternative commemorative practice in which medical students authored gratitude notes, poems, and artistic tributes addressed to body donors. This discursive article describes that initiative, situates it within the pluralistic society of Sri Lanka, and examines its implications for humanistic medical education. Drawing on the established literature on reflective writing, professional identity formation, and inclusive commemorative practice, student-authored expressions of gratitude are proposed as a pedagogically meaningful, complementary, and mutually reinforcing practice alongside formal ceremony. This experience offers a transferable model for newly established or resource-limited medical institutions navigating institutional constraints while remaining committed to the body donor commemoration.