A controversial British programme for the care of the dying is ensuring patients are well-looked after, researchers said yesterday.
But critics said the audit of the Liverpool Care Pathway showed about 25 per cent of patients and their families did not know they were involved in the programme.
The LCP has attracted controversy because of its requirement that a decision is made that a patient is dying, leading to US opponents of health care to brand it as "death committees".
Recently several British doctors wrote to the Daily Telegraph to complain that it led to death being hastened for some patients.
It was developed by the cancer charity Marie Curie in Liverpool.
The system is now used in growing numbers of hospitals, some 155 in total, according to the new findings.
The Marie Curie Palliative Care Institute, Liverpool, worked with the Royal College of Physicians on the audit.
It said the vast majority of patients are comfortable in the last 24 hours of life. Just ten per cent of patients received artificial fluids.
It said dying patients received good clinical care, tailored to their needs.
The audit calls for better communication with patients and carers and better assessment of religious and spiritual needs of patients and their families.
Dr Jonathan Potter, of the RCP, said: "The second round of the national audit of care of the dying demonstrates that, where the Liverpool Care Pathway for the dying patient (LCP) is used, people are receiving high quality clinical care in the last hours and days of life."
Professor John Ellershaw, of Marie Curie, said: "Hospitals need to recognise that care of the dying is part of their core business.
"To achieve excellence in the last hours and days of a patient’s life, all health care workers caring for dying patients and their relatives or carers should undertake training and education in care of the dying. A good death should be the expected not the exception!"
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