How much does Medicare pay for CPT 29405?

Medicare allowed an average of $75.18 per service and paid $57.78 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $290.02, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 29405?

Application of short leg cast. It was billed 12,676 times to 8,890 Medicare beneficiaries by 453 providers in 2024.

Does 29405 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $75.59 in an office setting and $48.55 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 29405 most?

Orthopedic Surgery, with 6,547 services from 224 clinicians. Next are Podiatry, Physician Assistant, Nurse Practitioner.

CPT 29405

Application of short leg cast

$75.18Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 12,676 services

Providers submitted

$290.02

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$75.18

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$57.78

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $290.02 for this code and Medicare allowed $75.18 — 3.9× 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 $57.78 (77%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $75.59
Hospital / facility: $48.55

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. 12,485 services were billed in an office setting and 191 in a facility.

Services: 12,676
Beneficiaries: 8,890
Providers billing it: 453
Total allowed: $952,982

What Medicare pays for CPT 29405

Across 12,676 services billed by 453 providers to 8,890 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $75.18 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 29405

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Orthopedic Surgery	6,547	4,594	$78.57	224
Podiatry	3,016	1,886	$77.47	111
Physician Assistant	2,343	1,819	$65.87	92
Nurse Practitioner	714	560	$63.99	25
Sports Medicine	56	31	$88.80	1

29405 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	1,276	$87.55	$61.59	45
Texas	1,136	$74.43	$57.93	37
Arizona	900	$72.84	$56.87	20
Florida	744	$76.45	$59.63	27
North Carolina	534	$69.47	$57.96	18
Illinois	515	$75.76	$58.02	19
Pennsylvania	446	$75.04	$60.00	15
Ohio	431	$72.94	$59.08	18
Alabama	399	$67.75	$60.82	17
Washington	397	$74.33	$57.52	14
New Jersey	396	$83.01	$61.26	14
Tennessee	369	$68.11	$59.09	12
Colorado	337	$80.76	$60.99	13
Missouri	310	$73.69	$60.11	11
Kansas	308	$68.47	$56.81	8
Virginia	297	$73.49	$56.22	13
New Hampshire	297	$80.85	$62.29	5
South Carolina	296	$74.83	$59.39	13
Louisiana	262	$68.92	$62.00	8
Michigan	235	$78.06	$58.82	9
Mississippi	226	$64.87	$58.35	5
Indiana	203	$70.31	$61.39	5
Georgia	199	$71.73	$57.51	11
Connecticut	191	$86.25	$60.52	7
Iowa	191	$71.18	$60.62	9
Massachusetts	186	$77.59	$57.99	9
Maryland	175	$81.98	$61.08	7
Arkansas	173	$66.92	$56.44	5
Kentucky	169	$70.38	$59.42	8
Oregon	138	$77.77	$59.10	8
Oklahoma	111	$72.18	$58.79	6
Wisconsin	110	$70.97	$58.81	4
New York	102	$76.89	$60.19	6
Utah	95	$74.61	$59.60	4
New Mexico	88	$69.08	$55.38	4
Alaska	71	$78.43	$56.01	2
Nebraska	71	$71.86	$61.46	4
Idaho	61	$45.43	$38.19	2
South Dakota	52	$72.96	$59.12	2
Minnesota	37	$87.31	$63.94	2
Montana	33	$68.04	$52.49	1
Rhode Island	31	$69.93	$49.89	2
Delaware	24	$66.46	$55.51	1
Hawaii	20	$83.26	$64.90	1
Vermont	18	$55.58	$43.62	1
Maine	16	$60.10	$46.20	1

Related codes

29425Application of walking cast covering below knee to toe$72.75
29445Application of walking cast covering foot$91.92

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.