Rukshana has been working in the NHS and charitable sector for the last 30 years as a provider, commissioner, Board member and senior leader. She is Barnardo’s first Director of Health, leading the transformation of the largest children’s charity in the UK to also become a health & social care provider. Rukshana is a Non-Executive Director at Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust, an Advisory Commissioner for the Health Devolution Commission and is Co-Chair of the Child Equity Collaborative with Sir Michael Marmot.

As chair of IBD UK, a collaborative of 17 Royal Colleges and patient organisations, she innovated the co-production of standards and a digital benchmarking tool now used by all IBD centres across the UK. During her career she has brought about key directional changes in the health sector, such as the evaluation of PALS Pathfinder Pilots, which led to the introduction of PALS in every hospital in England and the Patient Choice system now used by all GPs.

Rukshana has been instrumental in driving the infrastructure to improve health inequalities in the NHS, leading the first pilot to introduce ethnicity monitoring in primary care for the Department of Health and designing the national roll-out for all NHS Trusts. She has published widely in the field of health equity and was voted a Top 100 Social Impact Influencer in 2024.