Cindy Leonard

Healthcare Provider

Infusion Manager, Sister Caritas Cancer Center at Mercy Medical Center

She Brings Empathy and a Strong Ear to Those Navigating Their Cancer Journey

Cindy Leonard says that, as incredulous as it may sound — especially given the preconceived notions about cancer treatment and chemotherapy in particular — some of the visitors to the medical oncology infusion services at the Sister Caritas Cancer Center are sad when those treatments are no longer needed because they’re getting better and moving to the next step in their journey.

“They say they’re really going to miss us … they want to know if they can come back and visit,” said Leonard, adding that these sentiments are commonplace, but hardly universal.

And while they stem in part from doubts about whether the cancer is truly gone, apprehension about if or when it will return, and the comfort derived from seeing one’s care team every day or every week, they also result from the family-like atmosphere that exists here, and the compassionate care provided during what is generally the most difficult time in a patient’s life.

And no one exemplifies all of this more than Leonard, infusion manager at the Caritas Center and one of two 2025 Healthcare Heroes in the Healthcare Provider category.

She’s been working in the broad realm of oncology, starting in pediatric oncology, for nearly 40 years now, and she described it as a field where there are obvious challenges and many difficult days, but also rewards that perhaps few who don’t do this day in and day out could really understand.

“People who are not nurses or healthcare workers will say, ‘how can you do that? How do you take care of someone knowing that they might not make it? How do you do that without crying? How do you provide care and not get frustrated and say, this is not worth it?’” she said, listing just some of the questions people have for her. “I always say, ‘it’s not about that; it’s about what’s happening right now — you’re going to take care of them, and hopefully, whatever care you’re providing them makes a difference in their day and their life and helping them live a little longer so they can do things they want to do.’

“I can’t tell you how many patients over the years have had a goal,” she went on, becoming emotional as she did so. “Men who wanted … needed to get to their daughter’s wedding, for example. If you’re able to be a small part of them achieving that goal … there’s no reward greater than that.”

With that, she summed up why she loves what she does and why, at age 63, she’s not even thinking about retirement. For some sentiment on why those who work with her don’t want to see that day either, and what Leonard brings with to work every day, we turn to Dr. Philip Glynn, a Healthcare Hero himself in the Provider category (class of 2022), who has worked beside Leonard for 25 years now.

“Over her 40-year career, Cindy has shepherded hundreds of souls on their cancer journey, helping them navigate care as part of a club no one wants to join,” he said. “Sitting for hours in an infusion chair can be lonely, and Cindy not only makes sure patients feel heard during treatment, she also ensures that they are well cared for and comfortable. This is not an easy job, especially when outcomes are so often unfortunate. Still, Cindy is a fierce advocate for patients, and she handles the heavy burden of their care with grace and humility.

“I can’t tell you how many patients over the years have had a goal. Men who wanted … needed to get to their daughter’s wedding, for example. If you’re able to be a small part of them achieving that goal … there’s no reward greater than that.”

“At her core, Cindy is probably one of the kindest people anyone could meet, and couple that with … let’s call it unconditional empathy for people — she is the absolute example of a servant leader,” Glynn went on. “People around her, the nursing staff around her, they want to emulate her; I’ll bet every nurse there would say that Cindy is a role model.”

Such sentiment explains why Leonard is now also a Healthcare Hero.

Unconditional Caring

Like many previous honorees, as well as several members of the class of 2025, Leonard would qualify to be a Healthcare Hero in a number of categories, including — given how long she has been doing this — Lifetime Achievement.

But Provider seems most fitting because she is perhaps best noted for what she brings to, and does for, patients who come to the infusion center, where more than 17,000 treatments are provided annually.

“Her empathy for people going through the biggest life challenges imaginable … it knows no limit,” Glynn said. “It’s what I would call unconditional caring — she’s universally kind, professional, and thorough with everyone. And patients get it; they gravitate toward her.”

And they have done so for decades now.

Cindy Leonard with Dr. Philip Glynn.
Staff Photo

Indeed, Leonard has been an oncology nurse for nearly the entirety of a 40-year career in nursing. When she graduated from the College of Mount St. Vincent in the Bronx, N.Y., she knew she wanted to work in pediatrics.

“But those jobs are few and far between — that’s what most people want,” she recalled, adding that it took her three years to get into that specialty, and when she did, in 1987, it was in pediatric oncology at a hospital in New Jersey.

She would remain there until her family relocated to Western Mass. in 2001. Soon thereafter, she met Glynn, who happened to have an opening for a nurse in his oncology clinic at Noble Hospital in Westfield. The two have been working side by side ever since, with Glynn moving his practice to Mercy in 2012, and Leonard moving with him.

Since then, they have been part of continued expansion of the medical oncology center and witnesses to dramatic changes and new treatments for patients, especially immunotherapy.

“One of the beautiful things about immunotherapy is that it doesn’t make people sick; it’s not traditional chemotherapy where people are nauseous, vomiting, tired, and weak,” she explained. “This, along with other advances in cancer care, is one of the things Dr. Glynn and I reflect on a lot; we’ll say, ‘who would have thought 15 years ago that patients would be taking a medicine that doesn’t make them sick?’”

At the center, Leonard handles myriad responsibilities that fall into the categories of management and patient care, and she handles both with professionalism and enthusiasm.

“It’s what I would call unconditional caring — she’s universally kind, professional, and thorough with everyone. And patients get it; they gravitate toward her.”

During a typical 10-hour day that starts at 7:30 a.m., she will create a scheduling grid for all infusion and acute visits, 65 to 80 a day on average — a complex assignment.

“On any given day, there’s 10 to 12 nurses, and when you print the schedule, you assign a patient to a nurse every 30 minutes to an hour based on the acuity of the patient because they’re all here for a different reason,” she explained. “Some of the patients sit here all day and receive multiple medicines, which require a lot of coordination from the nurse, and others are here for only an hour, so the schedule has to be done fairly.”

Patients start arriving around 8, and they come in continuously over the course of the day, she went on, adding that physicians will call throughout the day with requests to add people to the schedule because they’re not feeling well.

Leonard also assures that all infusion, injection, and transfusion therapies are complete and have undergone prior authorization to obtain insurance approval, ensuring that the services are properly ordered to account for any change in clinical parameters and that they are fully reviewed and approved by physicians. Treatments often require coordination with other service lines, such as radiation oncology, surgery, or intervention radiology, and she said she oversees all this while taking on her own patient load.

Meanwhile, on the more administrative side, she collaborates with medical management, Joint Commission representatives, the cancer committee, and Mercy’s Education department to create annual competencies for nursing staff.

And she brings to all these responsibilities what Glynn called a ‘servant leader’ mentality. “She doesn’t back away from hard problems, she doesn’t back away from big responsibilities, and yet, there’s no job that’s too small.”

Navigating the Journey

But those who know Leonard will say that it’s not what she does that sets her apart and makes her a Healthcare Hero, but how she does it.

“The moment you hear, ‘you have cancer,’ that phrase is burned into your memory forever; those three words change everything — how you view your life to that point and beyond, how you interact with family and friends, and perhaps your belief in a higher power,” said Glynn, adding that Leonard has helped countess patients cope with a new level of vulnerability as they try to navigate all parts of this this unwanted journey.

This is the part of her work that many not in this field have trouble understanding, but for her, it’s a labor of love.

Cindy Leonard (right) with team members at the Sister Caritas Cancer Center.

“Dr. Glynn and I talk about it all time … we come to work every day, but we don’t consider it work,” she said. “It’s like that old saying — find what you love to do, call it work, and find a way to get paid for it. That’s how I feel.”

And as she talked about her work, she said it requires several qualities and skill sets, if you will, including compassion and empathy, the ability to listen, and the willingness to be honest with patients and not create unrealistic expectations.

“We tell them the truth, but we tell them both sides,” she explained. “We don’t just tell them the bad things; we’ll tell them the story of that one patient that did well and got to do things.”

Overall, Leonard said she and other nurses in medical oncology form strong bonds with patients, bonds that explain the piles of letters she’s received from patients and family members thanking her for all she does, as well as the myriad prayer cards from the funerals of patients that she has attended.

“If oncology is your calling and it’s something you’re able to do, it is very rewarding,” she said, while acknowledging that sometimes, visits to the infusion room stop not because the treatments are working, but because they are not, and there are no more options.

“There are often tears because we’re human,” she said. “And I believe that, as nurses and as a profession, as oncology nurses, it’s important that we’re able to acknowledge those feelings as well. It’s OK to cry with a patient; it’s OK to let them verbalize to you that nothing else is working and it’s time for the next step in their life.

“I’ve had many conversations over the years,” she went on. “A lot of it is listening, but a lot of it also is acknowledging their emotions, and often these patients will take the lead and talk and tell you that they’re OK with it, they understand, and they know that they did everything they could.

“They’ll express to you their wishes … they want to be comfortable; they want to die at home, or ‘oh my gosh, I do not want to die at home,’” she continued. “You work with the patients to help them express what their wishes are.”

Thus, listening is perhaps the most important skill in the cancer center, and it’s one of many that sets Leonard apart.

All this explains why some people are sad when their visits to the infusion room come to an end. But mostly, it explains why Leonard is a Healthcare Hero.