Patients should be encouraged to ask for information they want, but not have it forced upon them. Someone dying may, early in the illness, feel the need for less information than is required later on. The young usually need more information than the old, but generalisations are to be mistrusted. Relatives are to be listened to courteously but the plea "You won't tell him will you, he couldn't stand it" is often to be translated as "You won't tell him will you? I don't think I can handle it."