CPT 93998

Contractor-priced

93998 · PFS Q3 2016 · Historical

No national PFS rate in Q3 2016

Your Medicare Administrative Contractor prices this code case by case, usually after reviewing documentation.

Check for a published amount in your locality.

Service-location ZIP

View contractor sources and effective dates

CPT 93998 has no published national rate. It carries status C (carrier-priced) in the Q3 2016 release. Your Medicare Administrative Contractor prices this code case by case, usually after reviewing documentation. The blank amount means unpriced, not $0.

PFS status evidence

Physician relative value file (Q3 2016) · rvu16c.zip (PPRRVU16_V0517.csv row 15,566)

Inspect PFS status evidence

Code: 93998
Release: Q3 2016, revision 1
Result: Contractor-priced

Citations

Shows this code’s PFS status (C). Result: Contractor-priced.
Physician relative value file (PPRRVU)
Q3 2016 · revision 1

Latest revision of this release

Release period: July 1 – September 30, 2016

This PFS record alone does not establish a $0 allowance or a coverage determination. Any amount from another schedule needs its own evidence.

Record details
PPRRVU16_V0517.csv in rvu16c.zip (row 15,566)

hcpcs (col 1)

93998

modifier (col 2)

blank

status_code (col 4)

C

SHA-256: 81464316ee60bdd4aa33b47a636b521a77a73481c795300cbab67f48dbe432d9

Original source file

Plain-text summary

Why is there no national PFS amount for 93998?

Its status indicator is C (carrier-priced). Your Medicare Administrative Contractor prices this code case by case, usually after reviewing documentation.

Payment considerations Copy link

Here are the inputs and payment rules that apply to this code. Each link takes you to the detail below.

Assistant/co-surgeon treatment Context required Contractor pricing Applies

Other payment indicators (8)

Facility/non-facility: Not determined, Professional/technical component: Does not apply, Bilateral adjustment: Does not apply, Multiple-procedure reduction: Does not apply, Global surgery: Does not apply, NCCI same-day edits: Not determined, MUE behavior: Not determined, Other fee-schedule routing: Does not apply.

Why would a Medicare claim for 93998 be denied or paid less?

These come from CMS indicators on this page, not general billing advice.

Its status indicator is C (carrier-priced)—Your Medicare Administrative Contractor prices this code case by case, usually after reviewing documentation. See status indicators
Bilateral surgery: no bilateral adjustment. See billing policy
Assistant at surgery: restricted without documentation. See billing policy
Co-surgeons: payable with documentation. See billing policy
Team surgery: payable with documentation. See billing policy

Payer-specific coverage and documentation rules live outside these files, so a claim that clears every check here can still be denied on other grounds.

Reconciling a contractor-priced payment for 93998 Copy link

There is no national allowed amount for 93998, so every reconciliation of this line runs against the MAC fee schedule that was in force for the date of service rather than against a national baseline.

What to check

Compare the paid amount against the MAC fee schedule in force for the date of service; there is no national allowed amount here to reconcile against.
Check for documentation on file before appealing an assistant-at-surgery denial: payment on the -80 or -AS line is restricted for this procedure unless medical necessity is established.
Check for documentation supporting two surgeons before appealing a modifier 62 denial—co-surgeon payment on this procedure depends on it.
Reprice the line against the release, locality, setting, modifier and participation status that applied to the date of service before treating any difference as an underpayment.

Codes to compare

National Q3 2016 amounts at GPCI 1.000. A blank means this schedule does not publish a payable PFS amount.

Code	Office	Facility
93990 Priced as active rather than carrier-priced	$165.06	$165.06
94002 Priced as active rather than carrier-priced	$94.52	$94.52
94003 Priced as active rather than carrier-priced	$68.03	$68.03

Check an actual payment Model this code in a contract

Sources: CMS Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Relative Value Files; CMS Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Relative Value Files (status indicator field); 42 USC 1395w-4(i)(2) (SSA §1848(i)(2))—Assistants-at-surgery; CMS Medicare Claims Processing Manual (Pub. 100-04).

Which billing rules and modifiers apply? Copy link

Global period: what 93998's fee already covers Copy link

XXX Does not apply

The global surgery concept does not apply to this code.

Billing policy Copy link

These billing-policy indicators explain how 93998 is treated. They apply whether the code is nationally priced or carrier-priced: a restriction like "bilateral not allowed" still matters on a carrier-priced code.

Policy	Value	What it means
Bilateral surgery	0	No bilateral adjustment. The 150% bilateral payment adjustment does not apply to this procedure.
Assistant at surgery	0	Restricted without documentation. Payment for an assistant at surgery is restricted for this procedure unless supporting documentation establishes medical necessity.
Co-surgeons	1	Payable with documentation. Co-surgeons may be paid, but only with supporting documentation establishing the medical necessity of two surgeons.
Team surgery	1	Payable with documentation. A surgical team may be paid, but only with supporting documentation establishing medical necessity.
Multiple procedures	0	No reduction. No multiple-procedure reduction applies when this procedure is billed with others on the same date; each is paid at its full fee schedule amount.
Professional/technical split	0	No PC/TC split. This is a physician service code; the professional/technical split does not apply, and the code is billed as a single service.

Can you bill it with another code? Copy link

Check a pair of codes Copy link

Enter a second CPT or HCPCS code billed on the same date of service. We'll check the current NCCI procedure-to-procedure edit for the pair.

See every current NCCI pair for 93998 →

How has it changed? Copy link

When does this rate change?

CMS publishes a fee schedule release every quarter (January, April, July, October), and each is versioned here. See what changed each release, or get an email when a new release moves rates.

Sources: CMS Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Relative Value Files.

Usage and related codes Copy link

How often 93998 is billed Copy link

Across Original Medicare in CY2024, 93998 ranked #4,795 of the 7,879 CPT codes billed to Medicare that year, by patients served or total allowed dollars.

Beneficiaries

657

Office + facility beneficiaries combined

Services

679

Times it was billed

Allowed

$61,456

Total Medicare allowed dollars

Compare: ↑ #4,793 more popular · 49421 ↓ #4,800 less popular · 46750

2024 Medicare fee-for-service national totals. They exclude Medicare Advantage, Medicaid and commercial volume, so real-world use runs higher. This is a calendar-year snapshot from the CMS Physician & Other Practitioners dataset, on a different cycle from the Q3 2016 fee schedule above.

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Source & method

Show sources

Contractor amounts come from the MAC-published schedules and effective dates shown above. The PFS file shows this code is priced by the contractor. Past releases are never edited, so these sources stay valid after CMS publishes a newer one. Our methodology explains sourcing, parsing, versioning, and how we cross-check claims before we publish them.