AHA, Others Urge House and Senate Appropriators to Fund CHGME Program for FY 2027

Improve Children’s Access to Care: Increase Funding for the Children’s Hospitals Graduate Medical Education (CHGME) Program

May 2026

Dear Chair Capito, Ranking Member Baldwin, Chair Aderholt and Ranking Member DeLauro:

The Children’s Hospitals Graduate Medical Education (CHGME) program is the most important federal investment supporting the pediatric physician workforce to expand access to care for the nation’s children. As groups dedicated to protecting and advancing the health of America’s children, we thank you for your longstanding bipartisan support of CHGME, including a $5 million increase in Fiscal Year (FY) 2026. We ask you to provide $1.02 billion in FY 2027 to fund CHGME with the same priority as other federal physician training programs.

As you know, our country is currently facing a national health care workforce shortage, and pediatrics is no different. We are grateful for Congress’ consistent bipartisan support for the CHGME program, which, since its founding in 1999, has enabled children’s hospitals to dramatically increase pediatric physician training and significantly increase the number of pediatricians and pediatric specialists who care for the nation’s children. Each year, CHGME-funded children’s hospitals train thousands of general pediatricians and pediatric specialists, like child and adolescent psychiatrists, pediatric surgeons, pediatric cardiologists, pediatric dentists, pediatric podiatrists and more. Your continued support for CHGME is vital to maintaining and strengthening the pediatric physician pipeline.

CHGME is the backbone of the pediatric physician workforce and serves kids across the nation:

• CHGME represents just 1.7% of total federal spending on graduate medical education (GME).
• CHGME-affiliated programs are responsible for 80% of the increase in the number of new pediatric specialists trained nationwide since 1999.
• CHGME trains more than 55% of the nation’s pediatricians and pediatric subspecialists.
• CHGME hospitals serve children and teens from 99.6% of all counties in the U.S. and territories.

We are grateful for your work to provide $395 million for CHGME in FY26, which gets the program closer to alignment with the residency training funded through other federal programs. We need your support to boost funding for the CHGME program to help our pediatric patients now and into the future.

Investing in the pediatric physician workforce by funding the CHGME program at $1.02 billion in FY27 is critical to ensure timely access to care for children in your communities and across the country.

Sincerely,

Academic Pediatric Association
America's Essential Hospitals
American Academy of Pediatrics
American Association of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
American Hospital Association
American Medical Association
American Pediatric Society
American Psychiatric Association
American Psychological Association
Association of American Medical Colleges
Association of Medical School Pediatric Department Chairs
Catholic Health Association of the United States
Children’s Hospital Association
Federation of American Hospitals
National Alliance to Advance Adolescent Health
National Association for Behavioral Healthcare
National Association of Pediatric Nurse Practitioners
Pediatric Policy Council
Premier Inc.
Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine
Society for Pediatric Research
Society of Pediatric Psychology, Division 54 American Psychological Association
Vizient, Inc.
Youth Villages