Palliative Care and Hospice Education and Training Act

• Families and patients: Would fund public information and targeted materials for Medicare, Medicaid, and Veterans Health Administration beneficiaries and medically underserved groups, and promote palliative care starting at diagnosis across pediatric and adult populations.
• Health professionals and workforce: Would fund education grants, physician training, faculty career awards, fellowships, and career incentive awards across medicine, nursing, social work, chaplaincy, pharmacy, psychology, and related fields. Fellowship awards would be capped at up to $150,000 per person and the fellowship program would be limited to funding no more than 24 programs. Career incentives would carry service obligations of at least five years.
• Research and coordination: Would require the National Institutes of Health to develop a nationwide palliative care research strategy and, beginning January 1, 2026, permit NIH to conduct or support palliative care research. The bill also authorizes a coordinating hospice and palliative nursing training program.

*Would authorize about $15 million per year for the workforce programs and $5 million per year for hospice and palliative nursing training for fiscal years 2026–2030.*