Hospice · Reference

Hospice Rates

The FY 2026 Medicare hospice per-diem rates for all four levels of care, the Service Intensity Add-on, the labor shares used for wage adjustment, and the annual aggregate cap.

FY 2026 daily payment rates

Eff. Oct 1 2025

National rates before wage adjustment, for hospices that submit required quality data. The labor-share portion of each is then adjusted by the hospice wage index for the service location.

Level of careFY 2025FY 2026Labor share
Routine Home Care · days 1–60
RHC · rev 0651
$224.52$230.8366%
Routine Home Care · days 61+
RHC · rev 0651
$176.92$181.9466%
Continuous Home Care · per hour
CHC · rev 0652
$67.44$69.7675.2%
Continuous Home Care · full 24h
CHC · rev 0652
$1,618.59$1,674.2975.2%
Inpatient Respite Care · per day
IRC · rev 0655
$518.78$532.4861%
General Inpatient Care · per day
GIP · rev 0656
$1,170.04$1,199.8663.5%
Hospices that don't submit required quality data (HQRP) receive the update minus 4 points — a 1.4% reduction versus FY 2025 instead of the +2.6% increase.

Source: FY 2026 Hospice Wage Index & Payment Rate Update Final Rule (CMS-1835-F), eff. Oct 1 2025. Verify against the CMS Hospice Center before billing.

Aggregate cap

$35,361.44
FY 2026 cap amount per beneficiary
Up from $34,465.34 (FY 2025), increased by the 2.6% update. Total payments to a hospice in the cap year can't exceed this amount × the number of beneficiaries served. Run a cap check →

Service Intensity Add-on

During the last 7 days of life, RHC days earn an add-on for direct patient care by an RN or medical social worker — paid at the CHC hourly rate ($69.76), up to 4 hours/day combined.

SIA is in addition to the RHC per-diem; it does not apply to CHC, IRC, or GIP days.

How a hospice claim is paid

1 · Pay each day at its level-of-care rate (RHC tiered by stay day)RHC · CHC · IRC · GIP
2 · Wage-adjust the labor share of each rate by the CBSA hospice wage index× WI
3 · Add the Service Intensity Add-on for qualifying last-7-days RHC visits+ SIA
4 · Apply the inpatient cap (≤20% of days at GIP+IRC) and the aggregate capcaps

Open the Per-Diem Calculator →   Benefit Period Tracker →

Update: +2.6% (3.3% IPPS market basket − 0.7% productivity). Labor shares per CMS-1835-F.