Ishani studied Medicine at the University of Oxford and, following a period of core training, became an Academic Clinical Fellow in Public Health in the London Deanery. She was attached to the Health Protection Agency where most recently she has been working on measuring the health impacts of natural disasters.

In her spare time, Ishani enjoys reading and writing fiction. Her first book, The Dancing Boy, set in India, about a boy with two souls, was published by HarperCollins India in the summer of 2011.