End of life care services are in limbo after phasing out of Liverpool Care Pathway, MPs hear

Experts have condemned the “tiny” amount of funding allocated to end of life services, telling MPs that it undermines the quality of care for this universal experience.

They also voiced concerns about the absence of a reliable system to help with end of life care, after the enforced end of the controversial Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP) system last year. During the Health Committee’s first evidence session of its new inquiry into end of life care, MPs asked about the current state of palliative and end of life care.

Fliss Murtagh, reader and consultant in palliative medicine at the Cicely Saunders Institute in London, giving evidence, said, “I was quite shocked to discover that, if you look …