Background <p>The study conducted a comprehensive literature search from 2004 to 2024 to delve into the strong relationship between palliative care and family meetings.</p> Methods <p>We conducted a comprehensive search of the literature in the Web of Science Core Collection, published “English” papers, and the paper types were limited to “Article” and “Review”. The bibliometric tools CiteSpace, VOSviewer, SCImago Graphica, and COOC tools were used to process and visualize the data.</p> Results <p>The results show that the number of publications in this field has grown continuously for more than 20&#xa0;years. The USA was the largest contributor, followed by Australia and China. Although China ranks high in the number of publications, the average number of citations is still low, indicating that suggesting a need for more high-quality research. In the field of research institutions, the University of Washington and the University of Pittsburgh have a high level of productivity, but the potential for inter-institutional collaboration remains to be exploited, which provides a path for future collaborative development. In terms of authors, Curtis Jr. is by far the leading author in both the number of publications and citations and establishing him as a pioneering scholar in the field who has made remarkable contributions to the development of the discipline.</p> Conclusions <p>The development of family meetings is of great significance for critically ill patients and their families in palliative care. Bibliometrics aims to provide more powerful evidence for the future development of this field through visual statistical analysis.</p>