Dr. Aziza Shad and Sister Pat Parachini.
The end of treatment is not always the end of care. Sometimes, it is where something lasting begins, a circle of support that takes root and becomes a community. Sister Pat Parachini and the people drawn together through pediatric cancer care still gather years later, carrying with them faith, memories and hope.
Now retired, Sister Pat Parachini worked as a Chaplain at Georgetown University Hospital from 1997 to 2003 with families who had a child with cancer. Chaplaincy in pediatric cancer care is a practice of presence, showing up without trying to “fix” what can’t be fixed in the moment. A few of the children Sister Pat worked with are now in their 30s, including one she met when he was two years old.
In 2026, Sister Pat is still part of the community support group made up of mothers whose children had cancer and were treated by Aziza Shad, M.D., who is now the Chair of Pediatrics, and Chief of the Children’s Hospital at Sinai Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. The group is known as Aziza’s Army. Their connection is not only about looking back, it’s also about staying alert to what comes after. Continuous care becomes its own kind of comfort: a familiar clinician, prayers that don’t cease and a sense that nobody is left alone with the “what ifs.”
Sister Pat’s years of employment at the hospital mattered, and so does everything that comes after—the friendships that held, the mothers who stayed connected and the doctor who remained a trusted anchor. That is the long-term impact of compassion: it doesn’t just comfort people in the hardest chapter, it helps them keep writing the next ones.