Medicare hospitals must now tell patients about hospice care at discharge
H.R. 2437 — EASE Act of 2025 · Filed by Erin Houchin (R-IN) · Introduced Mar 27, 2025 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill requires hospitals to tell Medicare patients about hospice care options when they are discharged, specifically if they appear likely to need it. It also clarifies that hospitals must inform patients about home health services and post-hospital extended care when relevant. The requirement takes effect January 1, 2026.
Why we flagged it
The bill's operative mechanism is a straightforward mandate that hospitals disclose available end-of-life care options to Medicare patients at discharge. It is a transparency/informed-consent measure, not a funding, subsidy, or deregulatory instrument.
What the text implies
- Hospitals may face compliance costs to identify which patients are 'likely to need' hospice, home health, or extended care—requiring clinical judgment or new screening protocols at discharge.
- The requirement references hospice programs that 'participate in the program under this title and serve the area in which the patient resides,' which may exclude some private or non-participating hospice providers from the mandatory disclosure list.
- Increased hospice referrals could shift patient volumes and revenue streams between hospital-affiliated and independent hospice providers, depending on which programs hospitals list.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
Patients and families gain access to information about hospice and supportive care options at a critical decision point (hospital discharge), enabling more informed choices about end-of-life care. The requirement imposes a disclosure obligation on hospitals with no corresponding restriction on patient rights or remedies.
Who stands to gain
- hospice care providers (participating Medicare providers)
- home health agencies
- post-acute care facilities
Named in the bill
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), Medicare program, hospitals, hospice programs, home health agencies, Social Security Act Section 1861(ee)(2)(D)
Where it stands
- Mar 27, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Mar 27, 2025 — Referred to House Committee on Ways and Means · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on Ways and Means”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
1 lobbying clients named this bill on 1 disclosure filings across 1 quarter, Dec 2025 to Dec 2025. Those filings disclosed $0 in lobbying spend. A filing names 2 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 0% of bills with at least one filing.
Erin Houchin, the sponsor, reported $1,063,750 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- Ward & Smith on Behalf of the Town of Topsail Beach — $0 on 1 filing
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jan 15, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (1,480 characters) on Aug 21, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Dec 2025 to Dec 2025. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jan 15, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
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