How much does Medicare pay for CPT 51700?

Medicare allowed an average of $62.89 per service and paid $48.57 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $278.02, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 51700?

Simple bladder irrigation and/or instillation. It was billed 123,618 times to 79,307 Medicare beneficiaries by 2,998 providers in 2024.

Does 51700 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $68.44 in an office setting and $24.29 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 51700 most?

Urology, with 74,205 services from 1,881 clinicians. Next are Nurse Practitioner, Physician Assistant, Obstetrics & Gynecology.

CPT 51700

Simple bladder irrigation and/or instillation

$62.89Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 123,618 services

Providers submitted

$278.02

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$62.89

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$48.57

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $278.02 for this code and Medicare allowed $62.89 — 4.4× 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 $48.57 (77%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $68.44
Hospital / facility: $24.29

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. 108,083 services were billed in an office setting and 15,535 in a facility.

Services: 123,618
Beneficiaries: 79,307
Providers billing it: 2,998
Total allowed: $7,774,336

What Medicare pays for CPT 51700

Across 123,618 services billed by 2,998 providers to 79,307 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $62.89 per service. That is 1.6 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 51700

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Urology	74,205	51,109	$65.66	1,881
Nurse Practitioner	20,624	12,834	$56.67	541
Physician Assistant	14,017	10,067	$55.90	420
Obstetrics & Gynecology	11,809	3,266	$70.85	126
Ambulatory Surgical Center	1,473	1,199	$26.09	10
Undefined Physician type	768	324	$64.40	7
General Surgery	466	290	$23.60	4
Internal Medicine	111	89	$67.68	2
Certified Clinical Nurse Specialist	66	63	$31.01	4
Family Practice	46	34	$74.10	1
Gynecological Oncology	20	20	$71.12	1
Osteopathic Manipulative Medicine	13	12	$27.05	1

51700 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	21,921	$74.26	$50.90	313
Florida	13,259	$58.12	$43.97	208
Texas	7,912	$64.78	$50.84	238
Maryland	6,185	$45.38	$33.21	103
Pennsylvania	6,146	$62.50	$48.97	130
New York	4,978	$69.36	$44.94	137
Arizona	4,810	$65.27	$52.36	115
Illinois	4,513	$62.54	$47.35	130
Virginia	3,844	$65.56	$51.27	110
Tennessee	3,580	$56.24	$47.71	93
Georgia	3,363	$64.52	$54.05	111
North Carolina	3,290	$58.28	$46.75	94
New Jersey	3,235	$66.18	$45.76	80
Massachusetts	2,482	$66.97	$47.32	77
Ohio	2,236	$56.17	$44.72	76
Indiana	2,161	$63.76	$53.13	71
South Carolina	2,118	$53.82	$43.22	48
Michigan	2,020	$63.28	$49.56	84
Missouri	1,992	$58.79	$47.37	69
Oklahoma	1,927	$63.02	$53.65	43
Mississippi	1,852	$57.41	$50.20	52
Wisconsin	1,714	$52.21	$42.28	65
Nevada	1,624	$68.37	$52.55	46
Kansas	1,608	$58.21	$48.19	42
Kentucky	1,433	$55.05	$45.71	44
Colorado	1,314	$69.95	$52.82	51
Washington	1,264	$67.13	$47.86	40
Alabama	1,178	$59.71	$50.87	28
Arkansas	1,019	$53.95	$46.49	35
Iowa	964	$45.90	$37.59	31
Oregon	785	$64.69	$49.38	24
Minnesota	762	$69.83	$54.44	31
Delaware	737	$40.87	$30.54	9
Alaska	699	$72.63	$48.24	16
Louisiana	694	$57.66	$47.55	26
South Dakota	683	$31.29	$25.59	13
Connecticut	623	$68.61	$49.55	14
Utah	570	$56.50	$45.21	18
Nebraska	405	$62.05	$52.61	16
Idaho	309	$42.05	$34.09	15
New Mexico	259	$69.36	$57.09	9
Rhode Island	257	$69.54	$52.14	8
New Hampshire	171	$71.84	$52.54	5
Montana	165	$29.11	$22.46	8
District of Columbia	125	$66.62	$44.08	5
Hawaii	115	$69.56	$51.33	4
Maine	99	$48.14	$41.28	2
Vermont	82	$52.10	$41.42	4
Wyoming	53	$71.51	$60.14	2
North Dakota	28	$25.82	$20.20	2
Guam	24	$82.96	$58.65	1
West Virginia	17	$27.60	$20.35	1
Puerto Rico	14	$73.21	$59.89	1

Related codes

51798Ultrasound measurement of bladder capacity after voiding$11.33
51741Electronic assessment of bladder emptying$10.90
51702Simple insertion of temporary bladder tube$56.08
51784Non-needle measurement and recording of electrical activity of muscles$32.26
51701Insertion of temporary bladder tube$41.58
51797Insertion of device into abdomen$155.21
51720Instillation of anti-cancer drug into bladder$79.02
51728Complex measurement of pressure of urine flow in bladder$308.93
51705Simple change of bladder tube$86.83
51729Complex measurement of pressure of urine flow in bladder$338.91
51703Complicated insertion of bladder tube$133.52
51725Simple measurement of pressure of urine flow in bladder$165.67

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.