Today's era of modern medicine, prolongation of life and working span, developed diagnostics technologies and therapeutic possibilities also bring forth new assues we have not encountered with earlier.The increase of politraumatology in traffic and brain injuries, the increase of primary and metastatic neoplasms, as well as the increase of degenerative brain disease leads us to new challenges when modern medicine lacks to offer a radical approach to treatment, but only a palliative one. When is it over ?When to discontinue radical treatment and apply exclusively palliative care? We offer the account of issues from practice concerning patients suffering from brain tumours in terminal phases of their illness, amiotrophic lateral sclerosis, metastatic diseases, and persistent vegetative states.