How much does Medicare pay for CPT 32551?

Medicare allowed an average of $139.83 per service and paid $111.38 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $571.89, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 32551?

Removal of fluid from between lung and chest cavity. It was billed 1,330 times to 1,203 Medicare beneficiaries by 70 providers in 2024.

Which specialty bills 32551 most?

Pulmonary Disease, with 727 services from 37 clinicians. Next are Thoracic Surgery, Cardiac Surgery, Internal Medicine.

CPT 32551

Removal of fluid from between lung and chest cavity

$139.83Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 1,330 services

Providers submitted

$571.89

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$139.83

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$111.38

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $571.89 for this code and Medicare allowed $139.83 — 4.1× 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 $111.38 (80%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Services: 1,330
Beneficiaries: 1,203
Providers billing it: 70
Total allowed: $185,974

What Medicare pays for CPT 32551

Across 1,330 services billed by 70 providers to 1,203 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $139.83 per service. 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 32551

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Pulmonary Disease	727	653	$143.86	37
Thoracic Surgery	205	190	$125.01	10
Cardiac Surgery	96	83	$125.75	3
Internal Medicine	83	73	$145.41	6
Critical Care (Intensivists)	77	72	$145.13	6
General Surgery	73	67	$144.75	3
Physician Assistant	31	29	$138.48	2
Emergency Medicine	14	13	$158.16	1
Diagnostic Radiology	13	12	$140.88	1
Anesthesiology	11	11	$140.10	1

32551 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	194	$138.37	$100.74	9
Kansas	146	$132.58	$113.33	4
Florida	134	$147.51	$107.17	6
Arkansas	128	$135.68	$119.39	5
Texas	108	$144.39	$114.84	7
New York	103	$144.36	$94.78	5
Tennessee	69	$147.27	$114.44	5
New Jersey	68	$157.98	$114.88	4
Maryland	59	$99.54	$72.76	3
Kentucky	50	$139.83	$116.81	4
Massachusetts	50	$150.65	$115.94	3
Missouri	37	$146.81	$113.02	3
Ohio	34	$145.83	$112.36	2
Pennsylvania	26	$135.04	$107.59	2
North Carolina	24	$139.41	$114.59	2
Utah	23	$107.18	$80.43	1
Illinois	20	$155.73	$108.57	1
South Carolina	16	$139.46	$115.79	1
Mississippi	16	$132.25	$112.06	1
Nevada	13	$145.61	$119.34	1
New Mexico	12	$151.02	$119.62	1

Related codes

32555Aspiration of fluid from chest cavity$104.45
32557Drainage of fluid from chest cavity$139.36
32554Aspiration of fluid from chest cavity$87.63
32550Insertion of indwelling tube for drainage of lung fluid$209.41

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.