Well, she joined the storyline last year, she's an academic who has put her career before her personal life and as a result is unable to connect to with other people because of her anxiety and fear of failure.
In the first few episodes we saw her out shine her colleagues and show the beginnings of a promising career as a doctor, but over the course of the series it becomes apparent that she has some hidden problems.
She is an incredibly intense person who avoids spending time with workmates and doesn't seem to be able to make friends easily. Instead, she believes if she can show people how good she is at something that she'll be respected and accepted. The problem is that her personal life suffer as a consequence. People talk over her, ignore her or leave her out of conversations.
Last week's episode featured a graffiti artist who had painted a huge mural of the staff on the hospital wall... Everyone in hospital was featured, but Ruth's image didn't have a face - as if she was invisible to him.
Another heartbreaking episode saw her finally plucking up the courage to talk to a male nurse about her problems... and asked "Does everybody hate me?", but he'd fallen asleep and didn't answer.
This week saw her push herself further than before. She's been trying to impress senior staffers (again as a way to gain acceptance) with her out of hours research. She's been working through the night and hasn't been sleeping... her lack of sleep resulted in a fatal error when she didn't spot a serious health issue with a patient who later died.
That night when staff members went to take her out to help take her mind off what had happened, they found her hanging in her room.
The episode ended with doctors trying to resuscitate her.
It's so sad, and I'm sure many people can relate to her, I know I can.