When I was two years old, I had my first cardiac arrest. I was diagnosed with a rare cardiac and muscular condition. Since then, I have lived through hospitalizations, surgeries, and repeated medical crises. But what shaped me even more were the silences in between, where systems failed and institutions said "we don't have an answer for that,” and, in turn, the savvy I built to fight back.
As a child, I brought medical research to appointments, asking questions far beyond my years. By high school, I was cold-emailing the North Carolina Department of Health, frustrated by how resources for students with chronic illness were lacking. That grew into a statewide outreach project, where over a hundred students shared their pain.
In college, at Duke, I carried the mission forward out of necessity. Over two semesters, I poured 8–20 hours weekly into advocacy: hundreds of emails, meetings with administrators, engineers, and lawyers. It was exhausting, but it created change: Duke's first health-sensitivity training for orientation leaders, a new ADA ride-scheduling system, medical dining refunds for students too ill to swipe in, and emergency safeguards for students with cardiac conditions. Every win required relentless persistence.
Nationally, I serve as the only youth advisor to CYSHCNet, a pediatric research network of nearly 100 physicians and scientists. There, I co-authored a JAMA research letter, helped secure a federal grant, and shaped the network's first AI governance policy. With Boston Children’s Hospital, I reimagined the dignity owed to a patient in pain.
What inspires me is simple: patients themselves, children who invent creative hacks just to get through the day, families who fight for years to be heard.
What I gain from this work is not recognition but relief: knowing the next patient will not have to fight as hard as I did. My legacy, I hope, will be systems that make healthcare more intuitively human and stories that prove patient intelligence belongs at the center of change.
As a child, I brought medical research to appointments, asking questions far beyond my years. By high school, I was cold-emailing the North Carolina Department of Health, frustrated by how resources for students with chronic illness were lacking. That grew into a statewide outreach project, where over a hundred students shared their pain.
In college, at Duke, I carried the mission forward out of necessity. Over two semesters, I poured 8–20 hours weekly into advocacy: hundreds of emails, meetings with administrators, engineers, and lawyers. It was exhausting, but it created change: Duke's first health-sensitivity training for orientation leaders, a new ADA ride-scheduling system, medical dining refunds for students too ill to swipe in, and emergency safeguards for students with cardiac conditions. Every win required relentless persistence.
Nationally, I serve as the only youth advisor to CYSHCNet, a pediatric research network of nearly 100 physicians and scientists. There, I co-authored a JAMA research letter, helped secure a federal grant, and shaped the network's first AI governance policy. With Boston Children’s Hospital, I reimagined the dignity owed to a patient in pain.
What inspires me is simple: patients themselves, children who invent creative hacks just to get through the day, families who fight for years to be heard.
What I gain from this work is not recognition but relief: knowing the next patient will not have to fight as hard as I did. My legacy, I hope, will be systems that make healthcare more intuitively human and stories that prove patient intelligence belongs at the center of change.