The CY 2026 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Final Rule marks progress in recognizing family caregivers as essential partners in care. Thanks to sustained advocacy from the National Alliance for Caregiving (NAC), the Caregiver Nation Coalition, and the Cancer Caregiving Collaborative , CMS has taken important steps that strengthen access to caregiver support and advance whole-person care.
Key wins include:
- Permanent telehealth approval for Caregiver Training Services (CTS), expanding access especially in rural and underserved communities and supporting long-term integration of caregiver training into Medicare.
- Improved access to behavioral health aligned Community Health Integration (CHI) services, reducing barriers to mental and behavioral health support for families.
- Signals from CMS on future payment pathways that could support evidence-based caregiver programs, community partnerships, and chronic disease interventions.
An additional change of note for family caregivers includes CMS replacing “social determinants of health (SDOH)” with “upstream driver(s)” of health to better reflect the root causes of clinical and non-clinical needs. This change maintains the importance of addressing non-medical factors that influence caregiver impact and care quality.
Advocacy opportunities remain as CMS did not address several recommendations essential to strengthening caregiver supports, including clearer CTS billing guidance, alignment of reimbursement rates, updates to CHI/PIN time thresholds, and investment in provider education and technical assistance.
NAC and its partners will continue to advocate for clearer standards, stronger reimbursement pathways, and full inclusion of family caregivers in future CMS rulemaking and Innovation Center models.
Read the full Executive Summary.
