Palliative care in certain parts Europe is developing in different ways, both as a specialty and by doctors and nurses. Malignant diseases are most often a link to the provision of palliative care, but it is not necessary that a palliative patient is only a patient suffering from malignant diseases, but also all other patients suffering from diseases that affect the impaired quality of life that have a fatal outcome and require palliative care. The fear of death and the attitude of non-acceptance led to her being ignored. It has become a taboo subject and has been pushed out of immediate everyday life. The development itself encourages palliative care to be classified as a third branch of medicine in recent times. Even before the war, the need to provide palliative care was recognized. With Croatia's entry into the European Union, palliative care is being strengthened and improved. With the accession of the Republic of Croatia to the European Union, education and workshops are launched, and all family members of palliative patients are included in care. Palliative mobile teams have been formed, each county has its own palliative care coordinator, and further considerations are underway with the aim of even better improvement and provision of palliative care at the end of a patient's life. Comparing the data, Great Britain is still the leading country in the provision of palliative care, while Slovenia lags behind with progress and support systems for palliative patients. The Republic of Croatia is developing in this segment with an upward trend and follows all global guidelines and strategies. The paper presented the meaning of palliative care, ways of providing such care, how it works in European countries as well as in the Republic of Croatia after joining the European Union, with an emphasis on the role of nurses in the care of palliative patients.