The Compassionate Care Act aims to improve end-of-life care by expanding advance care planning education and making it easier for people to communicate their medical wishes. The bill requires the federal government to launch a national public education campaign about advance care planning, create a website for healthcare providers with resources and best practices, and establish pilot programs to train doctors, nurses, social workers, and other healthcare professionals in end-of-life care conversations. It also directs the development of quality measures for end-of-life care across different healthcare settings and authorizes continuing education programs on advance directives and palliative care for qualified health care providers. Additionally, the bill makes permanent the ability to use telehealth for certain hospice eligibility discussions and removes geographic restrictions for advance care planning consultations conducted via telehealth. The legislation requires multiple studies and reports, including an examination of whether a national advance directive registry is feasible and whether electronic health records should be required to have prominent fields for storing advance care planning documents. The bill affects Medicare, Medicaid, and CHIP beneficiaries, healthcare providers, and educational institutions training future healthcare professionals, with appropriations authorized as necessary to carry out its provisions.
Take Action
Your position
Add a comment
to comment on this bill.
Annotate the text
Highlight any passage on the Summary or Full Text tab to attach a note. Annotations appear on the Annotations tab.