The only source of palliative care development so far identified in Azerbaijan is the work of the Jewish Women’s Organisation of Azerbaijan (JWOA).¹⁶ The pilot project (1998-9) has been described in a detailed report, which notes:

‘The project’s problem consisted in and was aggravated by the fact that the patients’ relatives would not wish to bear the heavy burden of nursing [with patients who] suffer…a lack of attention, hopelessness and fear. The establishment of the hospice service at home has a great human sense because it is the only possible method of support intended for assistance to the patients and also their relatives, [who also] need moral and psychological aid and experience the same stresses together [with the patients]. To characterize our patients, we should say that we took under supervision those of them whom oncologists, radiologists and chemotherapists had already given up.’¹⁷

Nurses and ‘patronage sisters’ were especially trained to deliver the service and they in turn provided training for relatives. Following a detailed analysis of the medical, social and psychological problems of the patients and their families, the report of the pilot scheme makes the following conclusions: 1) hospice services should be free 2) hospice is a house of life, not of death 3) hospice is a complex of medical, psychological and social assistance to the patient 4) hospice is a school as well as support for relatives and friends of the patient. The report concludes with a quote from Victor Zorza: ‘the path to death is life up to the end.’¹⁸