| Summary: | Drawing upon an ethnographic research developed in two Portuguese palliative care units, this article seeks to analyze end-of-life practices, namely how they are perceived and negotiated among the various actors involved. Over a period of ten months in these units participant observation and in-depth interviews were conducted with twenty family members of patients with a life-threatening illness and twenty health care professionals. Against this backdrop, aspects related to the concept of a ‘good death’, the management of pain and suffering and the loss of consciousness were explored. The main findings pointed to an appreciation, both by professionals and family members, of an holistic intervention that guarantees the patient's physical, psychological, social and spiritual well-being, where the relief of physical symptoms is of particular importance and palliative sedation emerges as a mechanism that allows the patient to achieve a ‘good death’ (without suffering and in a peaceful way).
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