EXCLUSIVE: Adelaide Thunderbirds star Layla Guscoth opens up on her decision to fight COVID-19 as a doctor

Adelaide Thunderbirds star Layla Guscoth has opened up on her decision to step away from the netball court and put her medical studies to work amid the coronavirus outbreak.

The Birmingham-born netballer returned home to England back in March to help tackle the pandemic as a doctor.

After it was announced that the Suncorp Super Netball season would be placed on hold until at least the end of June, Guscoth felt it was best she put her skills to work.

The star goal defence admitted her decision to fly back home was an "impulsive" one, but felt it was for the best due to the doubt surrounding the season's commencement at the time.

"I think it was quite an impulsive decision," Guscoth told Wide World of Sports' Keeping Contact.

"Probably a week before we left, I hadn't even thought about leaving or coronavirus or anything like that.

"For the next few days, I felt really uneasy that I was prioritising myself and netball when I knew that I could and should contribute something to coronavirus.

"I emailed quite a lot of people at South Australian health to see if I could help. But with visa restrictions it's really hard to do anything medically on the sport visas.

"When the league announced a postponement, in my mind I was pretty clear that I felt I needed to do something to help the effort. The only place I could really do that was at home."

Guscoth admitted her home country has changed a lot since she first left for Australia.

Arriving back home in March, the international netball star admitted England has now become a "really difficult world."

"It's been really weird," she said.

"I came at the end of February. When I left England, it was completely normal.

"Since we've been back it's been a really difficult world. We're still in lockdown, not able to see friends and family and I've been at work quite a lot.

"We work long days, so at the moment I work 8am-9pm four days a week. Then I will have a few days off then go again and go into night shifts.

"On those days, I don't get to do a huge amount of training. I try to squish all my training into the days off.

"Go to work, come home, go to bed really for about four days, then have a bit of a break.

Guscoth said the Suncorp Super Netball league is currently in the process of figuring out how they can bring back their international stars who aren't in the country.

"We're hoping that somehow we will be able to get back in (Australia) and we know it's important for there to be some border control.

"I think the league is working quite hard with migration specialists to see if there's opportunities for not just me, but for others who travelled home at the end of March."