How much does Medicare pay for CPT 51701?

Medicare allowed an average of $41.58 per service and paid $31.08 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $182.71, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 51701?

Insertion of temporary bladder tube. It was billed 106,414 times to 86,174 Medicare beneficiaries by 1,634 providers in 2024.

Does 51701 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $42.69 in an office setting and $23.78 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 51701 most?

Obstetrics & Gynecology, with 50,857 services from 535 clinicians. Next are Urology, Nurse Practitioner, Physician Assistant.

CPT 51701

Insertion of temporary bladder tube

$41.58Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 106,414 services

Providers submitted

$182.71

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$41.58

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$31.08

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $182.71 for this code and Medicare allowed $41.58 — 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 $31.08 (75%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $42.69
Hospital / facility: $23.78

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. 100,168 services were billed in an office setting and 6,246 in a facility.

Services: 106,414
Beneficiaries: 86,174
Providers billing it: 1,634
Total allowed: $4,424,694

What Medicare pays for CPT 51701

Across 106,414 services billed by 1,634 providers to 86,174 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $41.58 per service. That is 1.2 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 51701

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Obstetrics & Gynecology	50,857	41,546	$43.66	535
Urology	24,549	19,318	$43.83	507
Nurse Practitioner	18,874	15,040	$35.08	359
Physician Assistant	9,240	7,962	$35.70	201
Undefined Physician type	1,791	1,472	$48.48	12
Certified Nurse Midwife	328	257	$43.10	5
Pediatric Medicine	169	125	$49.67	1
Family Practice	135	87	$45.84	3
Certified Clinical Nurse Specialist	110	79	$34.58	1
Internal Medicine	107	72	$49.81	3
Osteopathic Manipulative Medicine	58	58	$45.43	1
Emergency Medicine	54	50	$33.71	2
Hospice and Palliative Care	52	41	$52.33	1
Gynecological Oncology	47	29	$51.89	1
General Surgery	22	17	$45.32	1

51701 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
Florida	12,163	$42.28	$30.67	133
California	11,798	$45.47	$30.31	165
New York	7,520	$50.38	$31.64	110
Texas	7,370	$41.99	$31.19	107
Illinois	7,035	$40.97	$29.51	88
New Jersey	6,175	$47.21	$32.20	68
Virginia	4,102	$40.14	$29.64	51
Ohio	3,471	$38.23	$29.55	56
Missouri	3,416	$36.55	$28.33	43
Pennsylvania	3,330	$40.08	$29.69	77
Oklahoma	2,753	$39.51	$32.09	45
Maryland	2,685	$46.42	$31.90	25
Arkansas	2,389	$34.01	$28.33	26
South Carolina	2,380	$39.79	$31.44	38
North Carolina	2,248	$38.54	$29.79	41
Arizona	2,203	$40.41	$30.70	26
Indiana	1,944	$37.05	$29.09	41
Louisiana	1,943	$36.37	$28.23	42
Tennessee	1,857	$37.20	$29.57	40
Massachusetts	1,850	$40.35	$27.88	50
Nebraska	1,769	$37.64	$29.86	24
Minnesota	1,501	$38.89	$29.23	27
Alabama	1,442	$34.35	$28.62	22
Connecticut	1,372	$44.84	$31.17	24
Wisconsin	1,350	$34.06	$26.31	21
Kentucky	1,279	$35.80	$28.67	22
Washington	1,251	$42.54	$30.07	28
Georgia	1,201	$38.57	$29.76	37
Michigan	1,073	$34.52	$25.86	30
Oregon	891	$39.52	$29.89	18
Kansas	877	$39.32	$30.03	12
District of Columbia	705	$47.86	$30.81	9
Colorado	572	$42.91	$30.74	13
Mississippi	502	$36.54	$31.43	16
New Hampshire	352	$42.26	$30.74	5
Iowa	325	$28.68	$22.49	13
South Dakota	263	$22.21	$18.00	5
Utah	208	$40.23	$29.96	6
Hawaii	194	$46.19	$33.21	5
Idaho	114	$30.85	$24.83	4
Maine	109	$33.54	$24.05	4
Montana	98	$24.42	$18.33	4
Delaware	82	$30.45	$23.83	3
West Virginia	65	$30.66	$23.36	2
North Dakota	38	$27.34	$19.88	2
New Mexico	32	$21.56	$15.25	1
Nevada	32	$41.01	$29.25	1
Rhode Island	30	$43.35	$25.42	2
Wyoming	28	$43.42	$33.64	1
Puerto Rico	27	$43.94	$29.73	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
51700Simple bladder irrigation and/or instillation$62.89
51784Non-needle measurement and recording of electrical activity of muscles$32.26
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.