When Elizabeth “Liz” Marconi introduces herself to a new oncology patient, she asks for permission into the patient’s space.

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“I ask if I can have a little bit of their time,” she says. “And if they say no, that’s okay.”

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Her introductory gesture is a simple one; however, it reflects her commitment to an entire philosophy of care.

“I’m optional,” she explains. “[The hospital] is a space where people might not have a lot of options. They may not have much control or autonomy. So if today they’re saying, ‘No, thank you,’ that’s completely fine. Maybe later they’ll want to talk.”

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For Liz, honoring a patient’s choice—even in something as small as engaging in conversation—is as important as any resource she can offer. As she passes through infusion wings at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, she introduces young adults and caregivers to emerging AYA sarcoma-specific support programs. Her work acknowledges a central reality of cancer care: illness often strips away autonomy, and even small moments of choice can restore a patient’s sense of agency.

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Liz’s commitment to patient autonomy has been shaped over nearly two decades across pediatric oncology, social work, global health, and program development. Whether she is building support systems, meeting newly diagnosed patients, or collaborating with other oncological practitioners, she assures that one principle remains a constant: “We have to meet people where they’re at.”

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The Heart of Healing in Community

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Long before she entered oncology as a clinician or program director, Liz knew she wanted to work in helping professions, though not yet in what form.

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As an undergraduate psychology student at the University of Connecticut, she became interested in how people cope with adversity. That interest deepened when she began working at The Hole in the Wall Gang Camp, the Connecticut camp founded by Paul Newman for children with serious illnesses.

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Her time at camp reshaped her understanding of healing. “I realized there are so many different kinds of healing,” she says. At camp, illness receded from the center of a child’s identity. In its place, campers formed friendships and took part in activities with a freedom that came from a space where joy was not contingent upon health.  “It brought people together,” Liz recalls. “It created community, and they got to heal outside of the hospital.”

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Liz's undergraduate experience at the summer camp reframed her vision of healthcare. Medical treatment is essential, but insufficient on its own. Human connection, she realized, functions, in many ways, as its own form of medicine.

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Patients at the Core of Program Design 

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After graduating from UConn, Liz pursued a Master of Social Work at Columbia University, eventually joining Connecticut Children’s Medical Center, where she spent nearly eight years as an oncology social worker. Her patients ranged from infants to young adults in their mid-thirties, exposing her to the full developmental spectrum of cancer care. 

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Across diagnoses, treatments, relapses, and grief, one question continued to surface: How could systems better support patients before emotional crises emerged? This question gradually shifted her professional interests and focus from individual patient care to organizational leadership and program design.

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She helped develop survivorship initiatives, end-of-treatment programming, and psychosocial supports that extended beyond the clinic visit. Through her conversations with families, she observed a key insight emerge: while clinicians often framed treatment completion as a celebration, many parents experienced something closer to anxiety. “One mother told us she hadn’t really worried during treatment because she knew the chemotherapy was working,” Liz recalls. “Then treatment ended, and suddenly she thought, ‘Now what?’” This emotional gap led Liz to the creation of an end-of-treatment program designed to address not only medical transition but psychological uncertainty of remission. Families were given structured space to process fear, identity shifts, and the loss of routine.

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The program remained even after Liz left the organization, serving as a form of impact that, for Liz, defined meaningful work. “Your hope isn’t that people need you forever,” she says. “It’s that you’ve built something that continues without you.”

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Reframing Perspectives on a Global Scale

Alongside her oncology work, Liz pursued a second master’s degree in Global Health in Ireland. Studying alongside physicians, pharmacists, and public health leaders from around the world expanded her understanding of how context shapes care. 

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The most lasting lesson her studies in Global Health left her with was relational. “For me to come into a space and say, ‘This is what we have for you’—people might not want it,” she says. “People are much more likely to engage in something they’ve helped create.” This perspective shifted her approach from delivering solutions to building them collaboratively. “Here are some of the support we have,” she says. “But what does this patient need today?” Her global health experiences reinforced what her foundations at camp had already taught her. Listening precedes intervention.

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Traveling and working in places including Tobago, South Africa, and London further strengthened this lens. Across settings, she saw how culture, resources, and identity shape healthcare experiences differently, yet the need for dignity and voice remains constant.

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Serving Patient Needs in Sarcoma-Specific Systems 

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By the time Liz left Connecticut Children’s Medical Center after nearly eight years, her focus had expanded from individual care to systems-level thinking. She had worked across nearly every stage of illness and began to see recurring gaps between medical milestones and emotional needs. She viewed these gaps as limitations of structure, which led her toward a new phase of work, where she would build programs designed to anticipate those needs.

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At Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, she now serves as Program Manager for the Adolescent and Young Adult Sarcoma Program. The role integrates clinical support, program development, and long-term strategic design. “It uses both sides of my brain,” she says. “I get to meet patients, but also think about how we build better systems.”

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For patients with sarcoma, a rare cancer group, this work is especially critical. Many have never met another person with the same diagnosis. “Sometimes it’s the first time they’ve spoken to someone who truly understands,” Liz says.

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One early initiative involved strengthening a virtual support group for patients with desmoid tumors. Beyond maintaining the group itself, Liz focused on the infrastructure that sustains participation: outreach, coordination, and continuity. As a result of her dedication to the support group, there is hope that other sarcoma-specific support groups are on the horizon. Beyond serving their function as support spaces, these groups offer many young adult sarcoma patients a sense of recognition, often for the first time in their diagnosis. 

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Liz returns to the idea of community repeatedly throughout her work, as a clinical necessity. She has seen how support groups create continuity between patients, how conversations extend beyond scheduled meetings, and how connection reduces isolation that often accompanies rare disease.

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For adolescents and young adults, this work is especially important. Cancer interrupts identity formation at a time when many are building independence, relationships, and imagining their futures. Community, Liz believes, becomes more than a source of support. It becomes a reminder that life continues to exist beyond illness. "Community matters," she says. "It reminds people they are not alone in this." The philosophy echoes Liz’s broad set of clinical experiences, from camp to global research, where connection cultivates healing and healing proves relational. 

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Personhood in the Practitioner and Patient Relationship

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Caring for others, however, also requires learning how to care for oneself. Working in oncology means living alongside uncertainty every day, and over time, Liz has learned that self-care is not separate from clinical work, but rather it is part of it. She decompresses in ordinary ways, such as watching reality television, walking her dog, playing soccer, spending time alone, or calling her sister. "I think self-care evolves as you evolve," she says. The routines themselves matter less than the willingness to recognize what each season of life requires. Like patient care, self-care resists formulas and demands continual adjustment, reflection, and presence.

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That same openness to continual learning extends beyond her own well-being. When asked about the patients who have shaped her, Liz pauses. Some relationships, she says, remain with her long after treatment ends. "They become part of your journey," she says. "I still think about them." Over nearly two decades in oncology, patients have shaped her understanding of care as profoundly as any classroom or clinical training. They have taught her patience, the art of listening without an agenda, and the humility to sit with uncertainty rather than rushing to resolve it. Without naming it as such, Liz describes a philosophy remarkably similar to Narrative Medicine, Rita Charon's model of care that begins not with diagnosis, but with the patient's story. In Liz's view, healthcare is never one-directional. "Every meaningful relationship changes both people," she says.

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This reciprocal understanding is best captured by two simple sentences she has carried throughout her career. Early on, a patient offered Liz two pieces of advice: Be kind. Expect the unexpected. She has kept those words ever since. Kindness, she explains, has its basis in attentiveness. It is one’s willingness to recognize the unseen weight another person carries while honoring their autonomy. Her former patient’s advice to expect the unexpected reflects the reality of oncology itself, where outcomes shift, trajectories change, and all aspects of life seem to teeter on uncertainty. Together, the two phrases have become less a philosophy to profess than a practice of presence.

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Looking across nearly two decades in oncology, Liz Marconi's career reflects a profound continuity of care. From campfires in Connecticut to pediatric oncology wards, global health classrooms, and adolescent and young adult sarcoma programming at Dana-Farber, her work has remained anchored in the same key principles: listen before leading, collaborate before creating, and meet people where they are. At its core, her work is about much more than building programs or delivering care. It is about ensuring that, even in the most uncertain moments, the person is never lost behind the patient.

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"I see you."