Hospice care for improving terminally ill patients' quality of life

Despite various efforts for improving quality care at the end of-life (EOL), there are still many barriers not to reduce the burdens of patients with terminal illness and their care-givers. Many patients have uncontrolled pain, inappropriate use of life-sustaining treatments, socioeconomic burdens, and ethical conflicts. We need to establish strategies to reduce physical, emotional, socioeconomic suffering among the patients and their family members, and to develop national program for their dying with dignity. These efforts would improve patients' quality of life at EOL and economic loss of national health insurance, and sublimate the hospice to national movement.