Lasater KB, et al. - Researchers undertook this cross-sectional analysis of multiple linked secondary data sources to describe the quality of end-of-life care in US hospitals from the perspective of hospital nurses, and to evaluate the relationship between the nurse practice environment and end-of-life care quality. Participants comprised a total of 12,870 direct care registered nurses in 491 acute-care hospitals. Most nurses gave their hospitals an unfavorable evaluation of end-of-life care overall (58%) and said patients often experience painful procedures that were unlikely to change their outcome (53%). The nurse practice environment was identified to be the best predictor of poor quality. Compared to nurses in poor environments, nurses in the best environments exhibit 55% lower tendency to rate their hospital's overall end-of-life care quality unfavorably. Hospitals with poor nurse practice environments have significantly worse overall end-of-life care than hospitals with the best environments.