LONDON: At the age of 22, Indian-origin Heenal Raichura has qualified to become Britain’s youngest doctor and is all set to practice medicine.
Daughter of Nalin and Shobhna Raichura, Heenal was accepted into university to study medicine in 2002 when she was 16. Six years later she has passed her degree and is all set to start work at University College London Hospital where she hopes to become a surgeon.
Heenal said: “It’s quite a surreal feeling to actually, finally, become a doctor after six years of a degree. To finally come out at the end and say, ‘I’m a doctor’ was my childhood dream. It is an indescribable feeling... My parents tell stories about how I would come over and put my head against their chest because I didn’t have a stethoscope to play with. I was always interested in trying to figure out what was going wrong with the body.”
Her proud father Nalin, 65, said: “She encountered immense difficulty in finding universities that would accept her at the age of 16 because the minimum age at entry is 17 years 6 months.”
She was offered a place to study medicine at St George’s University in London where she six years later she has graduated with a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degree. She received her degree at a presentation ceremony in June and is believed to be Britain's youngest doctor.
On top of the normal five years of medical study Heenal also spent an extra year to get a degree in Anatomy and Developmental Biology from the University College of London. She lives with parents, who run a wholesale business her and 25-year-old sister Sonia.
