How much does Medicare pay for CPT 82728?

Medicare allowed an average of $13.33 per service and paid $13.33 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $79.22, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is CPT code 82728?

Ferritin (blood protein) level. It was billed 3,396,801 times to 2,243,338 Medicare beneficiaries by 8,894 providers in 2024.

Does 82728 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $13.33 in an office setting and $10.98 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 82728 most?

Clinical Laboratory, with 2,369,712 services from 630 clinicians. Next are Hematology-Oncology, Internal Medicine, Pathology.

CPT 82728

Ferritin (blood protein) level

$13.33Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 3,396,801 services

Providers submitted

$79.22

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$13.33

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$13.33

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $79.22 for this code and Medicare allowed $13.33 — 5.9× 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 $13.33 (100%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $13.33
Hospital / facility: $10.98

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. 3,396,438 services were billed in an office setting and 363 in a facility.

Services: 3,396,801
Beneficiaries: 2,243,338
Providers billing it: 8,894
Total allowed: $45,279,357

What Medicare pays for CPT 82728

Across 3,396,801 services billed by 8,894 providers to 2,243,338 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $13.33 per service. That is 1.5 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 82728

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Clinical Laboratory	2,369,712	1,633,260	$13.34	630
Hematology-Oncology	325,522	170,502	$13.30	1,104
Internal Medicine	180,971	125,110	$13.31	2,347
Pathology	177,859	89,710	$13.33	53
Family Practice	94,328	70,105	$13.24	1,828
Medical Oncology	74,455	38,335	$13.30	359
Nurse Practitioner	55,388	40,451	$13.28	1,195
Nephrology	24,210	15,393	$13.31	284
Endocrinology	22,223	12,601	$13.31	112
Physician Assistant	19,896	14,668	$13.29	488
Cardiology	11,906	7,323	$13.33	50
Rheumatology	10,817	6,674	$13.29	112
Hematology	7,683	3,756	$13.29	24
Gastroenterology	6,322	4,745	$13.21	128
General Practice	3,055	1,954	$13.31	28

82728 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	458,671	$13.34	$13.36	658
New Jersey	424,742	$13.35	$13.36	162
California	422,305	$13.34	$13.36	378
Texas	278,936	$13.33	$13.36	874
New York	258,666	$13.34	$13.36	744
North Carolina	215,925	$13.35	$13.36	588
Tennessee	103,925	$13.28	$13.36	771
Arizona	102,733	$13.34	$13.36	130
Illinois	97,445	$13.33	$13.36	309
Ohio	93,851	$13.33	$13.36	225
Alabama	93,082	$13.29	$13.36	267
Massachusetts	79,924	$13.35	$13.36	250
Georgia	77,227	$13.34	$13.36	303
Virginia	65,492	$13.31	$13.36	334
Maryland	65,438	$13.34	$13.36	178
Kansas	64,907	$13.35	$13.36	91
Pennsylvania	56,351	$13.34	$13.36	103
Washington	49,830	$13.33	$13.36	168
Nevada	35,080	$13.33	$13.36	60
South Carolina	31,541	$13.28	$13.36	237
Arkansas	26,594	$13.27	$13.36	158
Oregon	26,353	$13.31	$13.36	165
Oklahoma	24,233	$13.33	$13.36	53
Minnesota	22,570	$13.31	$13.36	228
Michigan	22,444	$13.33	$13.36	120
Colorado	21,850	$13.32	$13.36	68
Indiana	20,987	$13.29	$13.36	75
Wisconsin	20,484	$13.21	$13.36	55
Mississippi	14,516	$13.22	$13.36	109
Iowa	12,921	$13.30	$13.36	170
Kentucky	12,633	$13.32	$13.36	68
Louisiana	11,716	$13.32	$13.36	89
Hawaii	10,515	$13.31	$13.36	6
Utah	10,271	$13.29	$13.36	123
Missouri	10,266	$13.29	$13.36	125
Nebraska	9,046	$13.31	$13.35	75
New Mexico	8,240	$13.30	$13.36	22
Connecticut	4,919	$13.30	$13.36	50
Maine	4,898	$13.30	$13.36	56
South Dakota	4,862	$13.34	$13.36	59
Rhode Island	4,738	$13.33	$13.36	4
North Dakota	4,498	$13.34	$13.36	18
Idaho	1,915	$13.30	$13.36	23
Wyoming	1,464	$13.29	$13.36	29
New Hampshire	1,245	$13.36	$13.36	30
Montana	1,214	$13.32	$13.36	10
West Virginia	1,204	$13.30	$13.36	15
Puerto Rico	1,149	$12.94	$13.36	18
Alaska	1,044	$13.22	$13.36	28
Delaware	1,013	$13.35	$13.36	3
U.S. Virgin Islands	543	$13.35	$13.36	3
District of Columbia	311	$13.36	$13.36	5
Vermont	57	$13.36	$13.36	3
Guam	17	$13.36	$13.36	1

Related codes

82746Folic acid level$14.39
82784Gammaglobulin (immune system protein) measurement$9.09
82787Gammaglobulin (immune system protein) measurement$7.85
82785Ige (immune system protein) level$16.10
82747Folic acid level$17.26
82705Stool fat or lipids analysis$5.00
82725Fatty acids measurement$18.38
82777Galectin-3 level$42.22
82726Very long chain fatty acids level$19.35
82710Stool fat or lipids analysis$16.45

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.