Georgia CommonsSenate · Passed · 2025-2026 Regular Session
SB 130: Health; medical education funding and the service cancelable loan program; expand
Last action July 1, 2025 · Effective Date
Senate Bill 130 expands Georgia's medical education funding program to cover fellowship training and certain non-hospital medical facilities, and lets doctors in residency or fellowship programs qualify for the state's rural service cancelable loan program.
The summaries below were written by an AI model (claude-sonnet-5) from the text of the bill and are not part of it. Quote the text, not the summary. The stored text is the Enrolled version, the latest the General Assembly's website lists.
In plain language
Georgia currently pays hospital authorities and certain 'designated teaching hospitals' up to $10,000 per year for each medical resident they train, to help cover the cost of physician education. This bill broadens that system in two main ways. First, it renames 'designated teaching hospital' as 'designated institution' and expands the definition to include medical facilities with a Medicare/Medicaid certification number that run an accredited residency or fellowship program, not just traditional teaching hospitals. It also extends the per-physician funding and rulemaking authority of the Department of Community Health to cover fellows, physicians training in specialized fellowship programs after residency, alongside residents. Second, the bill changes Georgia's rural service cancelable loan program, found in Title 31 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, so that physicians still in residency or fellowship training can apply for loans, not just physicians who have already finished their medical education. Those physicians would agree to repay the loans by practicing in underserved rural areas of Georgia.
What the bill does
- Expands the definition of 'designated teaching hospital' to 'designated institution,' adding medical facilities with a Medicare/Medicaid certification number that run ACGME-accredited residency or fellowship programs.
- Adds fellows (physicians in ACGME-accredited fellowship programs) to the categories of trainees for whom the state pays up to $10,000 per year to hospital authorities or designated institutions.
- Expands the purpose of the rural service cancelable loan program to include making loans to physicians currently in residency or fellowship programs, not just those who already finished their training.
- Sets qualification rules requiring resident and fellowship physicians who get these loans to be U.S. citizens or nationals enrolled in an ACGME accredited program.
- Keeps the existing cap that no additional teaching hospitals or designated institutions can be added to the funding program until enough state funds are available.
Who it affects
Hospital authorities and teaching hospitals that train medical residents, newly eligible medical facilities with Medicare/Medicaid certification that run fellowship programs, medical residents and fellows, and the Department of Community Health and Georgia Board of Health Care Workforce, which administer the funding and loan programs. Rural Georgia communities that rely on the loan program to recruit doctors are also affected.
Why it matters
More types of medical facilities could receive state funding for training physicians, and doctors still in residency or fellowship training could get loans in exchange for agreeing to practice in underserved rural Georgia areas, potentially widening the pipeline of doctors available to those communities.
Key provisions
- Section 1 rewrites O.C.G.A. § 31-7-95, replacing 'designated teaching hospital' with 'designated institution' and adding medical facilities with a CMS certification number that run ACGME accredited residency or fellowship programs.
- Section 1 adds a definition of 'fellow' as a physician training in an ACGME accredited fellowship program at a hospital authority or designated institution.
- Section 1 extends the $10,000 per year, per trainee payment from the Department of Community Health to cover fellows in addition to residents, subject to pro rata reduction if funds are insufficient.
- Section 2 revises O.C.G.A. § 31-34-2 to add physicians in residency or fellowship programs to the groups eligible for loans under the rural service cancelable loan program.
- Section 3 revises O.C.G.A. § 31-34-4 to require resident or fellowship physician loan recipients to be U.S. citizens or nationals enrolled in an ACGME accredited program.
- Section 4 repeals conflicting laws.
From the bill
“'Fellow' means a physician receiving medical education and training at an ACGME accredited fellowship program through a teaching hospital operated by a hospital authority or designated institution.”
“A medical facility that has a certification number assigned by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to health care providers participating in the medicare and Georgia Medicaid programs”
Status timeline
- Effective Date
- Act 185
- Senate Date Signed by Governor (Senate)
- Senate Sent to Governor (Senate)
- House Passed/Adopted (House)
- House Third Readers (House)
- House Committee Favorably Reported (House)
- House Second Readers (House)
Show full history (15 actions)
- House First Readers (House)
- Senate Passed/Adopted (Senate)
- Senate Third Read (Senate)
- Senate Read Second Time (Senate)
- Senate Committee Favorably Reported (Senate)
- Senate Read and Referred (Senate)
- Senate Hopper (Senate)
Sponsors
- Mike Hodges (R, SD-3)
- Shawn Still (R, SD-48)
- Ben Watson (R, SD-1)
- Kay Kirkpatrick (R, SD-32)
- Billy Hickman (R, SD-4)
- Rick Townsend (R, HD-179)
Votes
- Senate voteFebruary 26, 2025
52 yea, 4 nay
- House voteMarch 31, 2025
155 yea, 7 nay (6 not voting, 12 excused)
Topics
- medical education funding
- rural health care
- physician residency and fellowship
- medical loan programs
- hospital funding