How much does Medicare pay for CPT 20527?

Medicare allowed an average of $76.06 per service and paid $57.03 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $289.84, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 20527?

Injection of medication into palm. It was billed 2,507 times to 1,752 Medicare beneficiaries by 106 providers in 2024.

Does 20527 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $77.01 in an office setting and $61.46 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 20527 most?

Hand Surgery, with 1,483 services from 63 clinicians. Next are Orthopedic Surgery, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, General Surgery.

CPT 20527

Injection of medication into palm

$76.06Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 2,507 services

Providers submitted

$289.84

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$76.06

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$57.03

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $289.84 for this code and Medicare allowed $76.06 — 3.8× 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 $57.03 (75%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $77.01
Hospital / facility: $61.46

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. 2,353 services were billed in an office setting and 154 in a facility.

Services: 2,507
Beneficiaries: 1,752
Providers billing it: 106
Total allowed: $190,682

What Medicare pays for CPT 20527

Across 2,507 services billed by 106 providers to 1,752 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $76.06 per service. That is 1.4 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 20527

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Hand Surgery	1,483	1,039	$76.60	63
Orthopedic Surgery	828	568	$74.06	35
Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery	182	131	$79.83	7
General Surgery	14	14	$87.68	1

20527 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	460	$81.94	$51.40	17
Florida	367	$82.74	$57.85	17
New York	215	$89.61	$56.42	10
Oregon	191	$58.58	$36.76	3
Arizona	143	$75.98	$55.43	6
Massachusetts	138	$79.80	$54.24	4
New Hampshire	86	$68.64	$49.08	4
Georgia	70	$68.34	$50.25	3
South Carolina	64	$76.37	$57.46	3
Ohio	60	$59.08	$38.47	3
South Dakota	56	$64.75	$49.90	2
North Carolina	53	$77.99	$58.56	3
Illinois	49	$82.45	$58.51	3
Pennsylvania	48	$79.09	$52.43	3
Tennessee	43	$73.58	$60.50	2
Washington	41	$69.72	$46.18	2
Delaware	37	$73.55	$54.14	2
Alabama	34	$63.97	$56.69	1
Indiana	30	$71.46	$51.98	2
New Jersey	28	$74.28	$47.96	1
Montana	27	$78.69	$52.93	1
Vermont	26	$47.20	$32.50	1
Michigan	25	$72.18	$35.58	1
Louisiana	25	$54.85	$29.43	1
Kentucky	23	$66.68	$51.01	1
Nebraska	22	$80.08	$67.18	1
Maryland	22	$77.21	$67.25	1
Texas	20	$70.83	$45.02	1
Oklahoma	18	$68.19	$49.63	1
Mississippi	17	$68.45	$60.46	1
Wisconsin	16	$65.03	$43.78	1
Connecticut	14	$85.97	$51.59	1
Missouri	14	$63.91	$45.16	1
Arkansas	14	$73.90	$63.82	1
Virginia	11	$83.50	$68.28	1

Related codes

20550Injection into tendon or ligament$50.46
20553Injection of trigger points$52.41
20552Injection of trigger points$44.76
20551Injection into tendon at attachment to bone or muscle$41.92
20526Injection of carpal tunnel$88.67

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.