Palliative care in non-malignant disease

Cancer is still routinely seen as a terminal condition with a historically integrated relationship to palliative care. However, there are a number of life-limiting non-malignant conditions with mortality rates and a symptom burden comparable to those of organ-specific cancers. Although there is increasing involvement in these conditions of palliative care services, this still falls short of the needs of the patient population in the UK. With an ageing demographic, there is an increasing need for a integrated multiagency approach to include specialist and non-specialist palliative care, primary care and specialist groups caring for patients with life-limiting non-malignant illnesses.