At the moment there is a variety of approaches to the foundations of palliative care. A lot of work has been done on the conceptual definition of palliative care, concentrating on questions such as "what is palliative medicine" and "what makes a certain kind of care 'palliative'?" (Doyle 1993; Clark and Seymour 1999; Janssens, Zylicz and ten Have 1999). Much attention has also been paid to a specific approach in palliative care, which is commonly described as 'holistic' or 'comprehensive' care. Furthermore, the foundations of palliative care are frequently discussed in terms of specific core values such as human dignity and sanctity of life. However, issues related to the foundations of palliative care are not often explicitly addressed in terms of goals, be it goals as regulative ideals or as more concrete, attainable goals.
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