This conference came in the wake of Lord Darzi's High Quality Care for All: Next Stage Review, which identified end of life care as one of the eight care pathways that the NHS will focus on.

The Department of Health published its End of Life Care Strategy in July of last year, which aims to reduce emergency admissions and enable people to live and die in a place of their choice and resulted in the department committing £286 million to end of life care services over the next two years.

To help deliver on these government initiatives this conference brought together primary care, social services, hospices, care homes, community nurses, commissioners, specialist palliative care, out-of-hours services, clinical, voluntary and community services and all those concerned with helping people to have a good death in a place of their choice.