Hospice Use Up 7% in a Year... Advance Directives for Life-Sustaining Treatment Top 3.2 Million

500,000 New Advance Directive Registrations Last Year
90% of the Public Say "Hospice Care Is Needed"...93% Willing to Use It

The number of patients who newly received hospice and palliative care in 2025 rose 6.9% from the previous year to 26,020. New registrations of advance directives for life-sustaining treatment also reached nearly 500,000, bringing the cumulative total to more than 3.2 million.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare, the National Hospice Center, and the National Agency for Management of Life-Sustaining Treatment released the "2025 National Hospice and Palliative Care Annual Report" and the "2025 Annual Report on the Life-Sustaining Treatment Decision System," which contain these findings, on November 5.

Hospice and palliative care is a medical service that comprehensively assesses and treats the physical, psychosocial, and spiritual needs of terminally ill patients with no chance of recovery, including pain and other symptoms. It is for terminally ill patients with conditions such as cancer, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and chronic liver cirrhosis, as well as patients in the dying process.

The life-sustaining treatment decision system establishes the criteria and procedures for withholding or withdrawing life-sustaining treatment that would only prolong the dying process without therapeutic benefit for patients in the dying process. An advance directive for life-sustaining treatment is a document in which patients personally state their wishes regarding decisions such as withholding or withdrawing life-sustaining treatment and receiving hospice care.

According to the report, 26,020 patients newly received hospice care in 2025, up 6.9% (1,702 patients) from 24,318 in 2024. The number has risen for three consecutive years, from 22,394 in 2023 to 24,318 in 2024.

At the end of 2025, a total of 194 institutions were operating hospice services, up six from 188 the previous year. By type, there were 104 inpatient institutions, 40 home-based institutions, 44 consultation-based institutions, and six long-term care hospital-based institutions.

Public awareness of and satisfaction with hospice care also increased. In a nationwide survey, 83.2% of respondents said they had heard of hospice care, up 2.8 percentage points from the previous year. A total of 89.9% said hospice care was necessary, while 93.1% said they were willing to use it. Satisfaction with the use of specialized hospice institutions stood at 94.7%, up 0.4 percentage points from the previous year.

In 2025, 499,961 advance directives for life-sustaining treatment were registered. Since the system was introduced in February 2018, cumulative registrations have reached 3,201,958. A total of 29,557 life-sustaining treatment plans were registered in 2025, bringing the cumulative total to 185,952.

The proportion of cases in which patients' own wishes were confirmed during the implementation of decisions to withhold or withdraw life-sustaining treatment also increased. There were 81,220 cases in which such decisions were implemented in 2025. In 52.2% of these cases, patients' wishes were confirmed through a life-sustaining treatment plan or an advance directive for life-sustaining treatment, up 19.7 percentage points from 2018, the system's first year.

The number of institutions registered to accept advance directives for life-sustaining treatment rose by 59 from the previous year to 819, while the number of medical institutions registered with an institutional ethics committee increased by 40 to 513.

Kwak Sun-heon, Director General for Health and Medical Policy at the Ministry of Health and Welfare, said, "As Korea enters a super-aged society, public interest is growing in ending life with dignity. We will support and improve the life-sustaining treatment decision system and hospice and palliative care so that everyone can fully express their wishes about the end of their life and have them respected."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.