Following in the steps of researchers such as Saunders (1958), Kubler Ross (1970b) and, more recently, Donnelly and Donnelly (2009), I wanted to learn by listening to the patient. I wanted to hear the patient’s story to enable me to understand how they felt about their transition to palliative care services and how they saw their future. While similar in my intention to these visionary researchers, I was unquestionably different. With a background in mental health research and quality and risk, my interest in research of this nature was questioned by some ethics committees and viewed with an air of suspicion by some health professionals working in palliative care. As a non-practitioner, was it ethical for health professionals who seek to protect their patients, to allow me to ask the dying what it is like to die?