The Work Between the Breakthroughs

May marks a season of transition. The school year winds down, summer plans take shape, and warmer, longer days bring people back outside. Appropriately, it is also Melanoma and Skin Cancer Awareness Month. The American Cancer Society estimates that approximately 234,680 new melanoma diagnoses and about 8510 melanoma-related deaths will occur this year, underscoring the importance of heightened awareness during this time.¹

As sunscreen becomes a seasonal staple and skin checks re-enter the public conversation, oncology pharmacists are uniquely positioned to reinforce that early detection and prevention are not just dermatology's domain; they belong to all of us who care for patients across the cancer continuum. The sun that draws people outside this time of year is the same sun that makes our work matter.

That sense of shared responsibility is a thread running quietly through this issue. Oncology pharmacy has never been a narrow discipline, and the work reflected here spans the clinical, operational, interpersonal, and systemic. Pharmacists are stepping into roles that would have been difficult to imagine a decade ago: guiding adaptive therapy decisions, supporting surgical teams in real time, managing the complexities of novel agent combinations, and rebuilding patient trust amid widespread misinformation. What emerges from these pages is a picture of a field carrying an extraordinary load with remarkable thoughtfulness.

Amid that clinical momentum, this issue also makes space for a more grounded reflection. A case study from Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, asks what it actually takes to keep patients connected to a basic medication such as acetaminophen when the supply chain fails. The answer, it turns out, has less to do with procurement strategy than with trust—between supervisors and staff, between leadership and the frontline, and between institutions and the people quietly sustaining them through prolonged and unglamorous operational strain.

As summer approaches and the days stretch longer, it is worth pausing to appreciate both how far this field has come and how much it continues to ask of the people within it. This issue honors both.

REFERENCE

1. May is Skin Cancer Awareness Month. American Academy of Dermatology Association. Updated May 1, 2026. Accessed May 11, 2026. https://www.aad.org/public/public-health/awareness-campaigns/skin-cancer-awareness-month