While everyone knows they are going to die, most of us now and again talk about it in terms of ‘if’ as opposed to ‘when’. However, although the prevalence of death is 100%, there are remarkable inequities in the circumstances surrounding it, the quality of care before death, and support for family members. This is true throughout Europe, as well as other parts of the world. Such inequity in end of life care is expressed through unequal access to appropriate symptom relief, lack of communication about imminent death and fallible fulfilment of preferred place of care at the end of life and dying. This is particularly significant given the ongoing demographic, epidemiologic and medical-therapeutic challenges in Europe: increasing life expectancy, an increasing proportion of the population dying from chronic, life-limiting conditions – in particular cardiovascular diseases – and increasing progress in therapeutic options and possibilities. In response, an increased interest in the development of palliative care has been recognised. Accordingly, emphasis is given on improving well-being, affirming life, active relief of symptoms and alleviation of suffering, as well as early and timely introduction of such palliative actions for those with lifelimiting conditions, often alongside rehabilitative or curative goals of care and therapies. However, steps towards changed practice still need to be taken for implementation of the knowledge available. Today, society assumes the patient’s home is the most preferable place for care at the end of life and dying, and this also ties in with many severely ill persons’ preferences. However, European countries differ statistically in regard to the proportion of deaths occurring in actual ordinary homes, in hospitals and in nursing homes. 1 Moreover, in European countries, the proportion of people with for example dementia-related diseases who die in hospitals vary from 3–46%. 2 Place of death also varies for several other groups, such as children. 3 Only a minority of the population (although this varies) are cared for in hospices or specialised palliative care settings and the match between preferred and actual place of death is lacking. At first glance, there appear to be no problems associated with this, since health policy-makers, professionals and researchers all now agree that palliative care can and should be practiced in any health care setting. Fittingly, palliative care is considered an orientation and quality marker for the promotion of quality of life and well-being in the proximity of death related to complex chronic conditions, progressive fatal diseases and frailty in old age. However, the accomplishment of palliative-oriented care at the end of life is not fulfilled in all types of health care settings. In particular, it is remarkable that hospitals fail in this regard, when patients have 24/7 access to registered nurses and physicians. Differences related to place of care at the end of life and