Rupal Shah, MD, Named UCSF Chief Physician Experience Officer
We are pleased to announce the appointment of Rupal Shah, MD, as UCSF Chief Physician Experience Officer, effective January 1, 2027.
In this new role, Dr. Shah will lead a comprehensive strategy to improve the physician work experience across UCSF Health, the UCSF School of Medicine, and our affiliated clinical sites. Reporting to the UCSF Health System Chief Medical Officer and the School of Medicine Dean’s Office, she will partner with physicians and institutional leaders to strengthen engagement, well-being, professional fulfillment, and retention. Her work will include identifying and reducing unnecessary administrative burdens, improving clinical work environments, and using physician feedback and data to guide meaningful change.
Dr. Shah brings more than a decade of UCSF experience as a clinician, educator, mentor, and leader. A professor of clinical medicine, she joined our faculty in 2015 and is a pulmonary and critical care physician whose clinical work focuses on advanced lung disease, interstitial lung disease, and lung transplantation.
Since 2017, she has served as Director of Faculty Experience for the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, supporting faculty across UCSF Health, Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, and the San Francisco VA. Working with division leaders, she has developed structured mentorship and sponsorship opportunities, career development programming, faculty recognition, and initiatives that strengthen connections across clinical sites. She also founded the Women in Pulmonary Medicine group at UCSF.
As Medical Director of Adult Patient Experience for UCSF Health since 2022, Dr. Shah has partnered with clinical and operational leaders to improve communication, advance equitable care, and strengthen the patient experience. Her contributions include expanding Relationship-Centered Communication training and supporting initiatives to improve language access and address disparities in patient experience. This work builds on her earlier service as Medical Director of Patient Experience for Inpatients.
Dr. Shah’s leadership and commitment to her colleagues and patients have been recognized with the UCSF Health Exceptional Physician Award in 2022 and the V. Courtney Broaddus Award for Leadership and Service in 2025.
Supporting our physicians is essential to the strength of our clinical and academic missions. Dr. Shah brings an understanding of the daily realities of clinical practice and a record of building programs that help colleagues feel connected, valued, and supported. We look forward to working with her to translate that experience into improvements across UCSF.
Please join us in congratulating Dr. Shah and welcoming her to this important leadership role.