How much does Medicare pay for CPT 71271?

Medicare allowed an average of $72.80 per service and paid $72.80 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $350.33, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 71271?

Low dose ct scan of chest for lung cancer screening. It was billed 422,719 times to 416,598 Medicare beneficiaries by 8,706 providers in 2024.

Does 71271 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $101.59 in an office setting and $49.42 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 71271 most?

Diagnostic Radiology, with 383,395 services from 7,769 clinicians. Next are Independent Diagnostic Testing Facility (IDTF), Interventional Radiology, Family Practice.

CPT 71271

Low dose ct scan of chest for lung cancer screening

$72.80Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 422,719 services

Providers submitted

$350.33

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$72.80

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$72.80

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $350.33 for this code and Medicare allowed $72.80 — 4.8× 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 $72.80 (100%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $101.59
Hospital / facility: $49.42

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. 189,505 services were billed in an office setting and 233,214 in a facility.

Services: 422,719
Beneficiaries: 416,598
Providers billing it: 8,706
Total allowed: $30,773,943

What Medicare pays for CPT 71271

Across 422,719 services billed by 8,706 providers to 416,598 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $72.80 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 71271

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Diagnostic Radiology	383,395	377,747	$70.64	7,769
Independent Diagnostic Testing Facility (IDTF)	17,048	16,880	$116.34	271
Interventional Radiology	11,085	11,060	$64.25	265
Family Practice	2,921	2,873	$89.72	116
Internal Medicine	2,457	2,428	$92.95	93
Pulmonary Disease	1,868	1,853	$93.77	74
Nuclear Medicine	872	745	$59.08	15
Cardiology	591	591	$117.07	22
Radiation Oncology	418	418	$84.53	11
Emergency Medicine	381	381	$92.22	7
Nurse Practitioner	324	324	$80.87	14
Critical Care (Intensivists)	181	181	$118.91	9
Pediatric Medicine	174	174	$83.71	4
Interventional Cardiology	168	168	$96.79	8
Hematology-Oncology	165	165	$90.59	5

71271 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
New York	24,611	$91.18	$82.99	468
North Carolina	23,315	$68.48	$70.12	413
California	22,903	$99.16	$88.20	522
Florida	21,605	$93.31	$92.64	440
Texas	20,271	$76.22	$76.08	497
Illinois	19,832	$63.85	$62.11	416
Massachusetts	19,694	$65.54	$60.38	297
Pennsylvania	19,259	$58.56	$56.63	435
Ohio	18,556	$55.32	$54.60	269
Virginia	16,986	$71.80	$70.36	249
Michigan	14,695	$57.82	$56.61	311
Maryland	13,187	$106.43	$99.13	171
Missouri	12,914	$55.75	$55.80	245
Tennessee	12,151	$68.52	$71.95	257
Georgia	10,716	$60.54	$60.43	246
South Carolina	9,878	$61.97	$63.69	167
Wisconsin	9,528	$59.96	$60.90	217
New Jersey	9,039	$106.66	$95.26	234
Minnesota	8,764	$72.94	$70.99	233
Washington	8,740	$71.10	$67.40	171
Kentucky	8,161	$61.11	$62.63	157
Indiana	7,479	$57.66	$57.86	159
Iowa	7,099	$62.45	$64.34	126
Colorado	5,529	$78.56	$74.29	148
Kansas	5,461	$65.76	$68.48	119
Arizona	5,341	$97.57	$97.85	129
Alabama	5,212	$70.12	$74.36	163
Louisiana	5,107	$63.24	$63.93	142
Nebraska	5,096	$56.11	$57.66	120
Connecticut	4,878	$88.78	$81.72	117
Oregon	4,374	$69.19	$68.07	98
Mississippi	3,952	$72.70	$77.83	84
Arkansas	3,925	$54.67	$57.90	95
Delaware	3,541	$74.73	$72.05	27
New Hampshire	3,452	$69.73	$67.57	87
Oklahoma	3,274	$54.01	$54.22	86
West Virginia	3,017	$51.20	$50.34	70
Rhode Island	2,481	$91.03	$84.80	50
Maine	2,093	$54.60	$53.23	60
Vermont	1,920	$53.35	$52.46	26
South Dakota	1,905	$56.92	$55.74	46
North Dakota	1,853	$53.83	$53.22	47
Idaho	1,699	$65.73	$66.11	50
Nevada	1,542	$97.29	$98.81	42
New Mexico	1,455	$80.05	$81.31	38
Alaska	1,379	$84.55	$70.43	31
Montana	1,151	$63.72	$63.02	33
Wyoming	872	$85.56	$87.05	22
District of Columbia	868	$96.29	$87.18	25
Hawaii	703	$90.64	$85.74	21
Guam	629	$148.87	$135.39	3
Utah	449	$58.99	$59.26	21
AP	63	$70.02	$64.22	2
Puerto Rico	50	$83.56	$81.73	2
AA	37	$67.31	$48.21	1
XX	28	$51.18	$47.94	1

Related codes

71250Ct scan of chest without contrast$66.48
71260Ct scan of chest$62.03
71275Ct scan of blood vessels of chest$88.49
71270Ct scan of chest before and after contrast$107.04

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.