How much does Medicare pay for CPT 15271?

Medicare allowed an average of $128.42 per service and paid $101.65 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $338.28, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 15271?

Application of skin substitute graft to wound of trunk, arms, or legs, 25.0 sq cm or less of wound 100.0 sq cm or less. It was billed 167,595 times to 35,921 Medicare beneficiaries by 1,527 providers in 2024.

Does 15271 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $134.77 in an office setting and $80.43 in a facility. The office rate is generally higher because the practice supplies the room, staff and equipment out of that single payment; in a hospital those are billed separately by the facility.

Which specialty bills 15271 most?

Nurse Practitioner, with 63,831 services from 589 clinicians. Next are Physician Assistant, Dermatology, Family Practice.

CPT 15271

Application of skin substitute graft to wound of trunk, arms, or legs, 25.0 sq cm or less of wound 100.0 sq cm or less

$128.42Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 167,595 services

Providers submitted

$338.28

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$128.42

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$101.65

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $338.28 for this code and Medicare allowed $128.42 — 2.6× less. That gap is normal and means nothing on its own: Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of what is billed, so the submitted figure describes a hospital chargemaster, not a price anyone paid. Of the allowed amount Medicare paid $101.65 (79%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $134.77
Hospital / facility: $80.43

The office rate is higher because the practice supplies the room, staff and equipment out of that payment. In a hospital the facility bills those separately, so the clinician's share is smaller — the total cost to Medicare is usually higher, not lower. 148,017 services were billed in an office setting and 19,578 in a facility.

Services: 167,595
Beneficiaries: 35,921
Providers billing it: 1,527
Total allowed: $21,522,550

What Medicare pays for CPT 15271

Across 167,595 services billed by 1,527 providers to 35,921 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $128.42 per service. That is 4.7 services per beneficiary, so this is a code patients typically receive more than once. The allowed amount is the figure that matters: it is what Medicare and the patient together owe, set by the fee schedule and adjusted for local practice costs. What a provider chose to submit has no bearing on it.

Who bills 15271

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Nurse Practitioner	63,831	12,217	$122.34	589
Physician Assistant	17,874	3,524	$127.12	130
Dermatology	14,935	5,584	$129.67	202
Family Practice	12,149	2,168	$136.26	102
General Surgery	11,933	2,666	$120.31	121
Internal Medicine	10,873	1,918	$144.59	62
Podiatry	7,102	1,323	$133.12	75
Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery	6,523	1,376	$135.21	48
General Practice	4,391	638	$150.26	18
Emergency Medicine	3,514	760	$116.10	33
Micrographic Dermatologic Surgery	2,166	900	$124.68	23
Vascular Surgery	2,002	499	$121.84	27
Undersea and Hyperbaric Medicine	1,267	287	$116.74	9
Physical Therapist in Private Practice	979	169	$159.57	6
Nephrology	920	141	$147.75	3

15271 reimbursement by state

Two different numbers. Allowed is what Medicare actually allowed in that state, which includes the local practice-cost adjustment. Standardized strips that geographic adjustment out of the payment, so it is the column to use when comparing states — a difference there reflects how the code was billed, not what it costs to run a practice locally.

State	Services	Allowed	Standardized pmt	Providers
California	44,482	$141.45	$101.26	249
Florida	26,197	$133.06	$102.29	246
Texas	17,216	$125.96	$101.71	149
Nevada	7,080	$124.76	$99.71	45
Illinois	6,673	$124.42	$93.45	66
Arizona	5,409	$125.28	$100.72	61
Oklahoma	5,256	$120.88	$103.27	38
Georgia	4,362	$119.29	$94.67	46
New York	4,008	$135.09	$92.96	51
New Jersey	3,513	$142.02	$101.42	40
Indiana	3,082	$96.40	$81.42	34
Kansas	2,622	$109.57	$96.31	23
Mississippi	2,620	$105.53	$92.06	33
South Carolina	2,455	$114.49	$97.97	30
Michigan	2,225	$120.03	$94.10	27
Massachusetts	2,037	$112.01	$85.24	25
Tennessee	2,005	$108.67	$93.28	24
Kentucky	1,924	$112.66	$95.00	16
Ohio	1,803	$125.37	$101.23	25
Virginia	1,787	$116.15	$93.14	28
Colorado	1,781	$127.25	$98.03	20
Alabama	1,687	$118.04	$101.98	21
Washington	1,573	$113.68	$86.78	15
Missouri	1,469	$98.17	$80.50	19
Pennsylvania	1,438	$129.76	$97.29	22
Louisiana	1,403	$110.11	$93.11	25
Oregon	1,150	$119.70	$94.71	9
Utah	1,143	$125.50	$103.50	14
Maryland	974	$186.16	$141.05	14
Minnesota	902	$121.13	$97.03	10
Wisconsin	787	$92.26	$77.06	9
Delaware	753	$142.09	$112.56	4
North Carolina	748	$100.68	$84.23	16
New Mexico	718	$123.19	$99.53	7
Arkansas	649	$106.40	$94.71	10
Idaho	555	$95.51	$82.19	7
Montana	511	$94.91	$75.74	7
Connecticut	492	$128.32	$92.70	8
West Virginia	470	$143.23	$109.90	4
New Hampshire	383	$75.19	$58.71	9
Nebraska	319	$111.56	$91.85	6
District of Columbia	226	$169.10	$116.66	2
Iowa	174	$101.68	$86.86	2
South Dakota	125	$109.93	$89.95	2
Rhode Island	120	$129.95	$95.15	3
Maine	101	$72.68	$58.86	2
Hawaii	101	$120.69	$87.71	3
Alaska	87	$104.92	$64.09	1

Related codes

15275Application of skin substitute graft to wound of face$129.23
15260Full thickness skin graft to nose$928.72
15272Application of skin substitute graft to wound of trunk$22.96
15274Skin substitute graft to wound 100.0 sq cm or more of trunk$48.85
15240Full thickness skin graft to forehead$841.38
15273Skin substitute graft to wound 100.0 sq cm or more of trunk$211.10
15220Full thickness skin graft to scalp$669.90
15276Application of skin substitute graft to wound of face$29.63

Billing this code is not the same as earning it

An allowed amount is revenue to a practice, not income to a clinician. It funds staff, premises, equipment and supplies before anyone is paid. What clinicians actually earn is published separately by the Department of Labor, and what industry pays them is published separately again by CMS — this site carries both.

What doctors are paid →·Look up a clinician →·All procedure codes →

Where this comes from. CMS Medicare Physician & Other Practitioners, by Provider and Service, 2024. It covers fee-for-service Original Medicare Part B only — not Medicare Advantage, not Medicaid, and not commercial insurance, which typically pays more for the same code.

How it is averaged. CMS publishes one average per provider per code. Every figure here is re-weighted by the number of services, so a clinician who billed the code 4,000 times counts 4,000 times more than one who billed it twice. CMS also suppresses any provider-code pair with fewer than 11 beneficiaries, so low-volume practice is missing from these totals by design.