"The whole system is greased to pay hospitals and others for expensive things people might not even want” at the end of life, says Dr. Lachlan Forrow, director of ethics and palliative care at Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital.

Working with the Circle of Life Children’s Center, a pediatrician at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey offers palliative care and pain management to seriously ill children and their families.

If you’re homeless in Washington, D.C. and sick, perhaps close to dying, and you end up in a city shelter, the people who work there might telephone a place called Joseph’s House and ask if they can take you in.