New Themes in Palliative Care.

Ed David Clark, Jo Hockley, Sam Ahmedzai Open University Press, 15.99 [pounds sterling], pp, 306 ISBN 0 335 19605 5

When I qualified, in the mid-1970s, teaching of symptom control and care of dying patients usually consisted of a lecture in the pharmacology course discussing opiate receptors and antagonists. On the wards we saw the terminally ill dosed with liquid morphmie in cocktails containing cocaine and alcohol, with the ensuing restlessness controlled with barbiturates. Patients were rendered unconscious, making their death more tolerable for the attendants. The alternative was a "high technology" death, with futile investigations and treatments offered until the …