To an extent, curing is about warding off death, because if illness is not stopped then a person may die. You could say that curing helps people to have a good quantity of life. The second function is to relieve a person's suffering, without curing the underlying problem. This aims to give the best possible quality of life. In giving pain relief to people with cancer, hospices acknowledge that the person is dying, but seek to give the best possible care.
People hold different views about whether artificial feeding given to dying patients is 'treatment'.
Most doctors and nurses think it is a basic part of good care, reducing suffering and responding to human need. When to withhold Treatments often carry risks, and a doctor needs to weigh up the balance between the potential for doing good and the potential for harm. Deciding whether to place an artificial hip in a young person with bone disease is complicated. However, at the moment, the techniques used actually damage the bone, so that it is unlikely a surgeon would be able to perform the procedure more than twice. Delaying treatment for as long as possible may benefit the patient.