Palliative care services in Australia

Of the 882,000 episode-level palliative care-related service events in 2022–23 (Figure 4): 

• 96% were funded through the health service budget, and 1.7% were funded under the Medicare Benefits Schedule
• 6.9% of medical consultations for palliative care were funded under the Medicare Benefits Schedule – this proportion was higher than allied health and/or clinical nurse specialist interventions for palliative care, and primary palliative care service events (0.1% and 1.7%, respectively).

Figure 4: Principal funding source of palliative care-related service events, 2022–23