How much does Medicare pay for HCPCS Q4021?

Medicare allowed an average of $8.05 per service and paid $6.20 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $42.30, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is HCPCS code Q4021?

Cast supplies, short arm splint, adult (11 years +), plaster. It was billed 1,568 times to 1,099 Medicare beneficiaries by 56 providers in 2024.

Which specialty bills Q4021 most?

Hand Surgery, with 795 services from 27 clinicians. Next are Physician Assistant, Orthopedic Surgery, Nurse Practitioner.

HCPCS Q4021

Cast supplies, short arm splint, adult (11 years +), plaster

$8.05Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 1,568 services

Providers submitted

$42.30

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$8.05

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$6.20

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $42.30 for this code and Medicare allowed $8.05 — 5.3× 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 $6.20 (77%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Services: 1,568
Beneficiaries: 1,099
Providers billing it: 56
Total allowed: $12,622

What Medicare pays for HCPCS Q4021

Across 1,568 services billed by 56 providers to 1,099 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $8.05 per service. That is 1.4 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 Q4021

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Hand Surgery	795	522	$8.05	27
Physician Assistant	352	237	$8.06	11
Orthopedic Surgery	183	148	$8.09	10
Nurse Practitioner	141	125	$8.10	5
Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery	65	42	$7.98	1
General Surgery	21	14	$7.37	1
Internal Medicine	11	11	$8.09	1

Q4021 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	362	$8.06	$6.30	7
Georgia	214	$8.00	$6.26	6
Arkansas	141	$8.10	$6.16	6
Connecticut	125	$8.09	$6.35	1
Massachusetts	114	$8.09	$6.31	4
Texas	114	$7.99	$6.34	5
Florida	63	$8.09	$6.45	5
Kansas	63	$8.09	$6.45	3
Mississippi	52	$7.99	$5.49	2
South Carolina	47	$8.11	$5.49	2
Ohio	47	$8.09	$6.45	2
Pennsylvania	41	$8.09	$6.45	2
Arizona	38	$8.11	$5.43	2
Delaware	28	$7.81	$6.05	1
Colorado	27	$7.98	$6.45	2
Virginia	27	$7.87	$6.51	1
Louisiana	16	$8.09	$6.45	1
Michigan	14	$8.10	$5.99	1
Kentucky	13	$7.87	$6.45	1
New Jersey	11	$8.09	$6.45	1
Iowa	11	$8.09	$6.45	1

Related codes

Q4010Cast supplies$23.01
Q4038Cast supplies$47.92
Q4022Cast supplies$14.44
Q4037Cast supplies$19.43
Q4049Finger splint$2.51
Q4046Cast supplies$21.80
Q4014Cast supplies$31.42

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.