Some of the team at Steeds Pharmacy: Owners Ali Alwash and Uvini Kahawatta with Divya and Kerilyn.
Some of the team at Steeds Pharmacy: Owners Ali Alwash and Uvini Kahawatta with Divya and Kerilyn.
Uvini Kahawatta and Ali Alwash may have just taken over a Levin-based pharmacy in December 2020, but they have great plans for the future.
Kahawatta and Alwash are not newcomers to the town, as they ran the Horowhenua Health Centre pharmacy for a few years from late 2016 and lived in Potts Rd.
During their time there they introduced complementary health therapies alongside the traditional medicines.
The couple has a passion for holistic health and alternative therapies, with Kahwatta being a qualified Reiki practitioner.
Steeds Pharmacy, in Oxford St, Levin, has been under new management since December 2020.
Kahwatta's family emigrated to Palmerston North when she was a young child and she headed to Otago University's School of Pharmacy in Dunedin to study at the age of 18.
However, she loves the vibe of small towns and rural-type cities so moved back to Palmerston North once done.
Alwash emigrated with his family from Iraq to Auckland when he was in his early teens. With his family having a very strong background in health he had early exposure to the medical field, including at the age of 10 watching his father perform surgery.
Alwash's natural inclination was to follow in his father's footsteps, but "after establishing I didn't like needles, blood or hospitals but loved chemistry and biology" he headed to the School of Pharmacy as well.
When the couple had their first child in 2019, they moved back to Palmerston North, where they continued to locum - Kahwatta in Feilding and Alwash in Levin.
Alwash was the locum pharmacist at Steeds, when staff told him the owners were going into receivership and asked if he thought it was time to buy his own pharmacy.
Alwash and Kahwatta knew the business had great local history and fantastic staff, and felt it may have been mismanaged in the past and just needed some TLC to help "steady the ship".
With a desire to move the focus of the pharmacy away from just being a drug store and begin introducing alternative therapies, possibly even a separate room focusing on holistic health, the couple have many great plans for the future.
New owners but same awesome service.
Alwash has also been embracing health technology over the past few years, with the development of a smartphone medication app, which is kind of like a medical chart on your phone.
His vision is for this app to improve the connection between health professionals and their patients by ensuring medication details are up to date and accurate and allowing ease of access to that information by the patients.
Alwash particularly wants this app to benefit Māori and Pacifica health - encouraging engagement and education around specific health issues related to these areas.
He has parked his plans for the app at this stage, partly because his focus is on the pharmacy. But its development is also at a point where it requires more expertise around marketing and testing. It also needs more funding to be able to take the next steps.
If you have connections who may be able to help with the progress of this app, or are interested in knowing more details about it, you can contact Ali Alwash at naturalhealthchemist@gmail.com.
