How much does Medicare pay for HCPCS Q9968?

Medicare allowed an average of $7.59 per service and paid $6.05 of that, the balance being the patient's coinsurance and deductible (2024 data). Providers submitted an average of $69.90, which is what they billed rather than what they received — Medicare pays its fee schedule regardless of the charge.

What is HCPCS code Q9968?

Injection, non-radioactive, non-contrast, visualization adjunct (e.g., methylene blue, isosulfan blue), 1 mg. It was billed 29,755 times to 2,297 Medicare beneficiaries by 68 providers in 2024.

Does Q9968 pay differently in an office than a hospital?

Yes. The allowed amount averaged $0.66 in an office setting and $7.82 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 Q9968 most?

Ambulatory Surgical Center, with 28,805 services from 63 clinicians. Next are Obstetrics & Gynecology.

HCPCS Q9968

Injection, non-radioactive, non-contrast, visualization adjunct (e.g., methylene blue, isosulfan blue), 1 mg

$7.59Medicare-allowed amount per service, averaged across 29,755 services

Providers submitted

$69.90

Asking price, not received

Medicare allowed

$7.59

The fee schedule figure

Medicare paid

$6.05

Balance is patient coinsurance

Providers submitted an average of $69.90 for this code and Medicare allowed $7.59 — 9.2× 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 $6.05 (80%); the rest is the patient’s coinsurance and deductible.

Office pays differently to hospital

Office / non-facility: $0.66
Hospital / facility: $7.82

The facility rate is higher for this code, which is unusual and generally means the service depends on equipment or staffing a hospital carries. 950 services were billed in an office setting and 28,805 in a facility.

Services: 29,755
Beneficiaries: 2,297
Providers billing it: 68
Total allowed: $225,840

What Medicare pays for HCPCS Q9968

Across 29,755 services billed by 68 providers to 2,297 beneficiaries, Medicare allowed an average of $7.59 per service. That is 13.0 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 Q9968

Specialty	Services	Beneficiaries	Avg allowed	Providers
Ambulatory Surgical Center	28,805	2,212	$7.82	63
Obstetrics & Gynecology	950	85	$0.66	5

Q9968 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
Texas	7,778	$7.76	$6.36	14
Florida	4,187	$7.80	$6.35	12
Utah	2,897	$7.52	$6.11	5
California	2,334	$8.00	$6.43	5
Washington	1,850	$8.10	$6.45	1
Wisconsin	1,510	$8.09	$6.45	1
Arizona	1,365	$7.34	$6.43	2
Kansas	1,354	$7.88	$6.32	1
Maryland	1,290	$8.05	$6.41	1
Michigan	1,250	$8.04	$6.40	1
North Carolina	950	$0.66	$0.52	5
Alaska	573	$7.80	$6.21	1
Iowa	550	$7.82	$6.35	1
Oklahoma	535	$7.76	$6.18	1
South Carolina	387	$7.91	$6.34	2
Georgia	267	$7.76	$6.18	1
New Jersey	195	$8.02	$6.46	3
Missouri	140	$7.96	$6.35	1
New York	119	$8.09	$6.45	3
Virginia	83	$8.26	$6.58	1
Connecticut	45	$7.82	$6.65	1
Nevada	31	$8.20	$6.53	1
Minnesota	30	$7.85	$6.48	2
Massachusetts	23	$8.11	$5.67	1
Kentucky	12	$7.90	$6.30	1

Related codes

Q9967Low osmolar contrast material$0.13
Q9966Low osmolar contrast material$0.36
Q9965Low osmolar contrast material$1.37
Q9957Injection, perflutren lipid microspheres, per ml$41.40
Q9958High osmolar contrast material$0.08
Q9956Injection, octafluoropropane microspheres, per ml$41.27
Q9969Tc-99m from non-highly enriched uranium source$14.28
Q9950Injection, sulfur hexafluoride lipid microspheres, per ml$18.49
Q9961High osmolar contrast material$0.28
Q9983Florbetaben f18$3080.60
Q9963High osmolar contrast material$0.21
Q9982Flutemetamol f18$3525.03

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.