# CPT 72146

> Medicare paid $223.47 for CPT 72146 in the office (non-facility) setting and $223.47 in a facility under the Q1 2015 Physician Fee Schedule, effective January 2015. These are the national allowed amounts before the ~2% sequestration cut and before locality (GPCI) adjustment. This is a 9.1% decrease from the previous quarter.

## What it is

An MRI of the thoracic spine - the middle stretch of the backbone that the ribs attach to - performed without injected contrast dye. It shows the vertebrae, the discs between them, and the spinal cord as it passes through the chest. It is the mid-back counterpart to the neck and low-back MRI codes, and it is the plain version rather than the dye-enhanced one.

## Selected release

- Release: Q1 2015 (2015 A)
- Effective: January 1 – March 31, 2015
- Status indicator: A
- Office (non-facility) national allowed amount: $223.47
- Facility national allowed amount: $223.47
- Sequestration: not applied

## RVUs and formula

- Work RVU: 1.48
- Office (non-facility) practice expense RVU: 4.69
- Facility practice expense RVU: 4.69
- Malpractice RVU: 0.08
- Conversion factor: 35.7547
- Formula: `(work_rvu × work_gpci + pe_rvu × pe_gpci + mp_rvu × mp_gpci) × conversion_factor`

## Source and citation

- Source: Physician relative value file (Q1 2015)
- CMS file: https://www.cms.gov/medicare/medicare-fee-for-service-payment/physicianfeesched/downloads/rvu15a.zip
- Parsed file: PPRRVU15_V1223c.csv, row 11,279
- Canonical page: https://localishealth.com/cpt/72146/2015/A
- Release-specific citation URL: https://localishealth.com/cpt/72146/2015/A
- Last significant update: 2026-08-04T03:05:39+00:00