Keele University graduate ‘spurred to go into medicine’ by rare condition

For years, Carys Havard experienced respiratory issues including breathing difficulties and fainting, but nobody knew what was causing her symptoms, which she was regularly accused of faking.

“I always knew deep down that there was something wrong, even if other people around me didn’t,” she said.

“I think that was what spurred me to go into medicine in the first place: ‘I’ll find out the answer, even if I have to do it myself.'”

Having now graduated from Keele University and qualified as a doctor, the 23-year-old has secured a role at the Cardiff hospital where she was diagnosed with a rare respiratory condition and underwent three surgeries, in what she describes as a “full-circle moment”.

As a teenager, Havard competed as a swimmer at a national level but struggled with breathing difficulties and regularly fainted in the pool.

“I was repeatedly told it was asthma and, at times, people thought I was exaggerating or making it up, which was incredibly difficult and isolating.”

In 2020, a diagnosis at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff “gave me answers”, she said.

She was found to have laryngomalacia, which causes tissue to fold into the airway.