How much does Medicare pay for CPT 73010?

Medicare allowed an average of $22.56 per service and paid $16.77 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $107.38, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 73010?

X-ray of shoulder blade. It was billed 25,235 times to 19,838 Medicare beneficiaries by 334 providers in 2024.

Does 73010 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $22.73 in an office setting and $8.98 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 73010 most?

Orthopedic Surgery, with 16,789 services from 188 clinicians. Next are Sports Medicine, Physician Assistant, Portable X-Ray Supplier.

CPT 73010

X-ray of shoulder blade

$22.56Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 25,235 services

Providers submitted

$107.38

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$22.56

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$16.77

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $107.38 for this code and Medicare allowed $22.56 — 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 $16.77 (74%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $22.73
Hospital / facility: $8.98

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. 24,934 services were billed in an office setting and 301 in a facility.

Services: 25,235
Beneficiaries: 19,838
Providers billing it: 334
Total allowed: $569,302

What Medicare pays for CPT 73010

Across 25,235 services billed by 334 providers to 19,838 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $22.56 per service. That is 1.3 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 73010

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Orthopedic Surgery	16,789	13,267	$23.56	188
Sports Medicine	2,517	1,890	$24.03	20
Physician Assistant	1,680	1,427	$19.95	36
Portable X-Ray Supplier	1,458	938	$13.30	31
Nurse Practitioner	611	497	$18.00	20
Hand Surgery	584	414	$23.83	7
Obstetrics & Gynecology	536	429	$29.74	1
Diagnostic Radiology	483	454	$11.12	19
Family Practice	411	367	$24.36	6
Osteopathic Manipulative Medicine	82	80	$26.92	1
Internal Medicine	31	28	$20.83	2
Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation	28	27	$22.70	2
Rheumatology	25	20	$23.87	1

73010 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	3,666	$26.76	$17.62	32
New York	2,837	$26.65	$16.65	31
Mississippi	2,450	$19.99	$17.17	31
Florida	2,450	$22.84	$17.00	28
Texas	2,004	$22.78	$18.90	32
Alabama	1,703	$20.38	$17.51	31
Louisiana	1,669	$21.64	$17.99	11
Tennessee	1,634	$19.83	$17.04	28
Virginia	1,016	$22.73	$17.60	10
Pennsylvania	948	$22.13	$17.40	17
New Jersey	734	$25.51	$17.04	9
Kentucky	585	$22.76	$17.54	4
Ohio	465	$18.78	$14.90	9
Georgia	432	$21.08	$17.98	9
Maryland	424	$11.52	$8.80	3
Utah	363	$21.22	$17.46	7
Montana	317	$22.37	$17.47	3
South Carolina	311	$17.81	$14.17	8
Illinois	306	$14.10	$11.14	4
Colorado	135	$22.89	$15.34	4
Missouri	132	$17.17	$14.28	3
New Hampshire	124	$23.52	$17.31	3
Washington	104	$19.49	$14.10	3
Arizona	94	$21.91	$17.49	2
Michigan	87	$20.51	$16.63	3
West Virginia	75	$20.36	$17.29	1
Nevada	36	$22.28	$16.55	2
North Carolina	36	$13.73	$10.57	2
Arkansas	34	$10.34	$8.83	1
Connecticut	29	$25.35	$18.10	1
Massachusetts	19	$9.16	$6.06	1
Oklahoma	16	$7.85	$4.77	1

Related codes

73030X-ray of shoulder$22.04
73080X-ray of elbow$16.52
73060X-ray of upper arm$11.37
73090X-ray of forearm$10.89
73070X-ray of elbow$16.13
73020X-ray of shoulder$11.35
73000X-ray of collar bone$17.88
73050X-ray of both collar bones joints$26.32
73040Review by radiologist of shoulder joint image$119.55

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.