How much does Medicare pay for CPT 51705?

Medicare allowed an average of $86.83 per service and paid $64.74 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $309.69, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 51705?

Simple change of bladder tube. It was billed 59,518 times to 20,971 Medicare beneficiaries by 1,245 providers in 2024.

Does 51705 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $91.73 in an office setting and $45.60 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 51705 most?

Urology, with 38,117 services from 807 clinicians. Next are Nurse Practitioner, Physician Assistant, Ambulatory Surgical Center.

CPT 51705

Simple change of bladder tube

$86.83Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 59,518 services

Providers submitted

$309.69

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$86.83

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$64.74

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $309.69 for this code and Medicare allowed $86.83 — 3.6× 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 $64.74 (75%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $91.73
Hospital / facility: $45.60

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. 53,192 services were billed in an office setting and 6,326 in a facility.

Services: 59,518
Beneficiaries: 20,971
Providers billing it: 1,245
Total allowed: $5,167,948

What Medicare pays for CPT 51705

Across 59,518 services billed by 1,245 providers to 20,971 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $86.83 per service. That is 2.8 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 51705

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Urology	38,117	13,585	$93.63	807
Nurse Practitioner	10,342	3,520	$74.36	212
Physician Assistant	10,228	3,493	$76.77	203
Ambulatory Surgical Center	374	126	$48.39	7
Interventional Radiology	143	88	$60.22	5
Family Practice	98	24	$44.89	1
Diagnostic Radiology	76	60	$50.90	5
Osteopathic Manipulative Medicine	48	12	$44.82	1
Internal Medicine	43	24	$103.14	1
Vascular Surgery	21	15	$48.83	1
Obstetrics & Gynecology	15	13	$98.26	1
Certified Clinical Nurse Specialist	13	11	$40.49	1

51705 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	5,646	$101.49	$67.61	95
Maryland	3,680	$89.81	$63.34	54
New York	3,325	$95.57	$63.86	71
Pennsylvania	3,104	$86.17	$63.34	61
Florida	2,874	$91.86	$68.43	67
Massachusetts	2,602	$90.84	$62.66	49
Texas	2,537	$86.47	$65.91	59
Arizona	2,233	$86.64	$65.71	48
Illinois	2,203	$89.73	$66.75	44
Missouri	2,126	$79.72	$62.92	45
South Carolina	2,069	$78.29	$61.35	45
Washington	1,978	$87.98	$63.11	42
North Carolina	1,783	$76.94	$60.72	46
Virginia	1,775	$94.76	$67.28	48
New Jersey	1,706	$93.79	$63.68	30
Ohio	1,674	$85.58	$65.71	35
Colorado	1,614	$91.74	$65.68	41
Kansas	1,409	$75.06	$60.27	31
Oklahoma	1,289	$85.95	$69.69	27
Oregon	1,039	$91.02	$65.31	28
Iowa	986	$67.60	$56.28	14
Minnesota	756	$88.62	$65.85	22
Georgia	754	$85.90	$67.32	19
Indiana	707	$77.37	$63.24	16
Arkansas	674	$71.03	$58.84	15
New Mexico	634	$71.40	$55.35	9
Michigan	623	$89.12	$65.64	14
Nevada	585	$85.86	$64.82	18
South Dakota	585	$79.38	$59.44	14
Wisconsin	516	$66.45	$52.12	13
Nebraska	499	$77.24	$61.41	9
Connecticut	477	$102.34	$69.36	13
Idaho	468	$71.13	$55.03	11
Montana	455	$68.87	$49.12	11
Louisiana	441	$73.40	$56.56	8
Alaska	420	$95.06	$58.26	5
Utah	319	$82.89	$64.40	6
District of Columbia	311	$80.10	$52.53	4
New Hampshire	307	$82.69	$57.43	9
Mississippi	301	$65.14	$52.73	5
Tennessee	296	$82.49	$68.17	7
West Virginia	296	$57.35	$44.57	5
North Dakota	291	$42.50	$32.60	6
Delaware	235	$86.12	$62.73	9
Kentucky	208	$84.32	$66.08	4
Hawaii	157	$43.60	$31.05	2
Alabama	149	$84.10	$65.11	3
Wyoming	141	$83.53	$61.84	3
Maine	133	$56.82	$45.66	2
Rhode Island	128	$88.08	$64.67	3

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
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
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.