How much does Medicare pay for CPT 64718?

Medicare allowed an average of $559.85 per service and paid $442.21 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $3960.42, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 64718?

Release and/or relocation of elbow nerve. It was billed 16,802 times to 15,402 Medicare beneficiaries by 827 providers in 2024.

Does 64718 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $592.26 in an office setting and $559.50 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 64718 most?

Ambulatory Surgical Center, with 7,427 services from 326 clinicians. Next are Hand Surgery, Orthopedic Surgery, Physician Assistant.

CPT 64718

Release and/or relocation of elbow nerve

$559.85Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 16,802 services

Providers submitted

$3960.42

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$559.85

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$442.21

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $3960.42 for this code and Medicare allowed $559.85 — 7.1× 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 $442.21 (79%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $592.26
Hospital / facility: $559.50

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. 184 services were billed in an office setting and 16,618 in a facility.

Services: 16,802
Beneficiaries: 15,402
Providers billing it: 827
Total allowed: $9,406,600

What Medicare pays for CPT 64718

Across 16,802 services billed by 827 providers to 15,402 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $559.85 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 64718

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Ambulatory Surgical Center	7,427	6,834	$616.34	326
Hand Surgery	4,229	3,865	$552.24	225
Orthopedic Surgery	3,985	3,657	$549.05	217
Physician Assistant	571	515	$77.09	30
Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery	333	294	$539.84	15
Nurse Practitioner	130	123	$74.97	7
Neurosurgery	50	47	$614.11	3
General Surgery	43	37	$530.08	2
Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation	18	15	$557.88	1
Sports Medicine	16	15	$539.66	1

64718 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	1,742	$559.21	$455.25	76
Texas	1,379	$562.99	$460.70	67
Georgia	925	$554.14	$462.11	42
California	797	$640.11	$434.65	36
Illinois	750	$547.81	$439.18	34
Tennessee	589	$503.63	$443.82	28
Pennsylvania	585	$554.95	$454.58	30
Missouri	572	$492.45	$417.75	31
North Carolina	545	$551.68	$461.74	28
Virginia	532	$552.05	$448.12	32
Colorado	489	$608.64	$484.66	26
Indiana	485	$512.55	$434.11	24
Maryland	476	$679.03	$535.06	18
South Carolina	446	$525.14	$446.67	24
Washington	427	$550.40	$437.18	21
Massachusetts	381	$621.19	$470.24	18
Kansas	373	$492.59	$422.21	18
Nebraska	366	$454.22	$384.66	16
New York	366	$733.43	$538.39	20
Ohio	365	$551.66	$458.35	18
Oklahoma	337	$543.36	$464.32	18
New Jersey	268	$605.80	$454.57	13
Delaware	266	$555.02	$442.85	11
Louisiana	258	$503.78	$443.68	11
Arkansas	248	$483.76	$433.19	10
Alabama	229	$500.11	$455.72	13
South Dakota	229	$463.28	$382.53	12
Arizona	228	$560.73	$451.74	13
Michigan	213	$609.04	$500.45	12
Mississippi	211	$542.92	$502.74	12
Idaho	178	$511.43	$443.26	8
Iowa	165	$498.87	$433.02	10
Kentucky	148	$562.59	$477.87	9
Oregon	141	$668.76	$521.24	5
Nevada	138	$604.26	$472.50	7
Minnesota	133	$619.15	$488.32	7
Montana	130	$592.12	$494.07	7
Alaska	110	$622.04	$441.10	5
New Hampshire	97	$551.06	$440.39	6
Wisconsin	93	$532.32	$461.57	7
Utah	71	$577.45	$488.17	4
New Mexico	66	$652.50	$536.24	3
Wyoming	57	$432.17	$343.87	4
Connecticut	56	$674.48	$498.95	4
Rhode Island	48	$679.52	$543.35	3
West Virginia	44	$525.13	$417.99	3
Guam	18	$506.67	$384.42	1
North Dakota	17	$561.86	$463.96	1
Maine	15	$564.18	$469.19	1

Related codes

64721Release and/or relocation of hand nerve$553.77
64708Release of arm or leg nerve$313.51
64727Release of nerve$175.78
64772Incision or removal of spinal nerve$403.77
64722Release of unspecified nerve$209.77

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.