Dr Raheelah Ahmad

Overview

Raheelah Ahmad is a Reader in Health Systems with over a decade of research and capacity strengthening focusing on innovation and change in national and international contexts. She is a Co-lead for the Informed Policy Pillar and Research Strategy Advisor (Health Systems and Policy) at the Fleming Initiative. She is part of the Senior Management team and was the Director for Global Engagement (2021-2025). 

Raheelah joined City in Nov 2019 and leads the Health Management and Leadership and the Innovation and Change teaching on the Health Management MSc programme at City. She also contributes to the Master of Public Health Programme. With expertise in research, capacity strengthening, and healthcare innovation, she has over a decade of national and international experience. 

She is Senior Mentor for the DHSC/UK Government Fleming Fund Policy Fellows Programme, Knowledge Mobilisation Lead for National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Protection Research Units (HPRU): Respiratory Infections at Imperial College London. She was the Deputy Chair of The Surveillance and Epidemiology of Drug-resistant Infections Consortium (SEDRIC).

Raheelah is also the KM lead for the Wellcome Trust funded international collaboration CAMO-Net to address AMR, where she is supporting the co-development of contextually relevant tools, guidelines, and practices that can be readily implemented with the support of governments and policymakers.

Preceded by a decade of management experience in the English National Health Service, she is a recipient of the prestigious NIHR Fellowship in Knowledge Mobilisation and PI and Co-I on research commissioned by The World Health Organisation, NIHR, ESRC/UKRI, Wellcome Trust. She co-leads the Implementation Course in Infection Control (EUCIC), in collaboration with the University of Geneva Hospitals and Zurich University, in its 8th year of running and contributes to the Healthcare Infection Society and UKHSA foundation course on Infection Prevention.

Qualifications

• PhD Health Management, Business School, Imperial College London, United Kingdom
• MSc Health Services Management, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, United Kingdom
• MSc Medical Informatics, City University & Guy’s & St Thomas’ Medical School, United Kingdom
• PGCE, King's College London, United Kingdom
• BSc Mathematics, University College London, United Kingdom

Employment

• Director for Global Engagement, City, University London, United Kingdom, February 2021 - 2025

Visiting appointments

• Visiting Scientist, Harvard University, 2019 - present
• Adjunct Faculty, Dow University of Health Sciences, Pakistan, 2019 - present

Memberships of committees

• Informed Policy Co-Lead, Fleming Initiative, September 2025 - September 2029
• Technical Advisor, Fleming Fund, 2020 - present

Languages

Urdu

Expertise

Geographic Areas

• Africa - Southern
• Asia
• Europe

Title of thesis: Parent-Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health Communication in South-Eastern Nigeria: a qualitative study

October 2018 - September 2021

Summary of research

Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health (ASRH) remains high on the global agenda due to high burden of ASRH issues particularly in low resource settings. Using the social ecological model for communication and behaviour as a lens, this qualitative study aims to amplify adolescents’ voices on their experiences and preferences of getting sexual health information from their parents and other sources. This research seeks to inform the design of relevant sexual health interventions that address adolescents’ needs.

Supervisory Team
1. Dr Raheelah Ahmad
Senior Lecturer, School of Health Sciences
Division of Health Services Research and Management

2. Dr Katherine Curtis-Tyler
Senior Lecturer, School of Health Sciences
Division of Health Services Research and Management

Funding
Self-funded

Publications and Presentations
7th SHS Doctoral Research Conference- City University of London
Topic: Parent-Adolescent Interaction on adolescent sexual and reproductive health in Sub-Saharan Africa

Selected Projects

Co-I: NIHR HPRU for Healthcare Associated infections and Antimicrobial Resistance, NIHR HPRU Respiratory Infections, NIHR HPRU Modelling and Health Economics - NIHR 3 x £5 million 04/2020 – 60 months

PI: Evaluation of antibiotic use in out of hours settings - Public Health England £40,000 (08/2019 - 12 months)

Co-I: Evaluating Pharmacy led advise for Urinary Tract Infections - Public Health England £65,000 (08/2018 - 12 months)

PI: Optimising knowledge mobilisation - NIHR £215,000 (06/2016 – 36 months)

Co-I: Improving surgical outcomes and reducing mortality and morbidity in maternal, neonatal and paediatric populations: optimising antibiotic use and infection prevention - Research England Grand Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) £147,723 (11/2018 - 9 months)

Co-I: Antibiotic use across Surgical Pathways - Investigating, Redesigning and Evaluating Systems; India, South Africa, Rwanda, England, Scotland. GCRF/ESRC £1.9 million (05/2017 - 48 months)

PI: Evaluation of family medicine reforms in Turkey - World Bank/MoH £80,200 (11/2011-12 months)

Research students

1^stsupervisor

• Dr Ijeoma Usonwu, Research Student

Publications by category