Modern palliative care: an exercise in prevention and partnership.

Palliative care is no longer solely an excercise in controlling suffering at the end of life. If we are to apply the principles of palliative care throughout the course of illness, both the culture and the organization of palliative care services must change. New partners must be enlisted in more sophisticated, increasingly academic partnerships. This change, while welcome and necessary, must come about with perservation of the core values of palliative care.