The American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine (originally chartered as the Academy of Hospice Physicians in 1988) is an organization of physicians devoted to advancing hospice and palliative medicine in the United States. The academy’s mission is “physicians dedicated to promoting quality hospice care for the terminally ill through medical education, research, and training.” The academy obtained specialty recognition from the AMA in 1996 and became the first physicians’ group to publish its position on physician-assisted suicide in 1991 and again in 1997.