Palliative care, an approach used to improve the quality of life of patients with life-limiting illnesses and their families through identification, assessment and treatment of pains (physical, emotional, psychological or spiritual), is an important part of the World Health Organization’s agenda (1). WHO’s target for Sustainable Development Goal 3 (2016-2030) is to devise and implement palliative care policies for 40 million people. However, only 14% of the global population was reported to be receiving palliative care (2). More strikingly, palliative care, which is claimed to be a basic human right (3), is inaccessible to the majority of the population in LIMCs, including Ethiopia, which are characterized with astounding numbers of patients seeking the care (4).

Accordingly, emerging circumstances and research findings show that there are extensive unmet palliative care needs in Ethiopia. A study (5) revealed that 95.5% of oncology patients in Ethiopia were diagnosed with moderate or severe pain, and of these, 24% were not prescribed analgesia. According to this study, more importantly, 80% of the non-communicable diseases were reported as severe pain. To make matters worse, a considerable number of severe cases, including cancer and HIV/AIDS, can be left untreated at all. Untreated pain and high costs of illness have been found to be major contributors to psychosocial distress, exacerbating the conditions of patients and exposing them to poor quality of life (5). These are among the instances that vividly show the acute need for palliative care services in Ethiopia.