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Procedure price report · Radioisotope scan and function studies

Measurement of radioactive tracer uptake in one area

CPT 78835the billing code this page is about

Numerical measurement of how much radioactive tracer collects in a single body area, reported in addition to the nuclear imaging study itself.

Hospitals typically charge $616 cash for this outpatient procedure — the median across 676 hospitals that filed a usable cash price; the average of the middle 60% is $619. Most fall between $214 and $1,294 (20th–80th percentile).

Hospitals
676
States
46
Filings dated
Apr 2025 – Sep 2026
Computed
September 25, 2026
Prices checked
through September 24, 2026

Median: half of hospitals filed less, half more — and it is a price some hospital actually filed. Average of the middle 60%: the mean of the prices between the 20th and 80th percentiles. We never publish the plain average, the lowest or the highest price: the extremes in hospital price files are chargemaster artefacts, not prices anyone pays.

What hospitals charge, from cheapest to most expensive

Cash price percentiles, outpatient, across 676 hospitals. Each figure is a price a hospital filed. 10th: one in ten hospitals charges less; 25th: a quarter charge less; Median: half charge less; 75th: three quarters charge less; 90th: nine in ten charge less.
10th25thMedian75th90th
$92$291$616$1,111$2,075

The most expensive tenth of hospitals charges at least 23× what the cheapest tenth charges ($92 vs $2,075).

How the prices are spread

$47 – $71: 25 hospitals$47$71 – $108: 26 hospitals$108 – $165: 32 hospitals$108$165 – $251: 52 hospitals$251 – $383: 100 hospitals$251$383 – $584: 71 hospitals$584 – $890: 132 hospitals$584$890 – $1,357: 89 hospitals$1,357 – $2,069: 50 hospitals$1,357$2,069 – $3,155: 48 hospitals$2,069median $616price bands are equal on a log scale
Hospitals per price band (625 of 676 — the bands cover the 5th to 95th percentile)
FromToHospitals
$47$7125
$71$10826
$108$16532
$165$25152
$251$383100
$383$58471
$584$890132
$890$1,35789
$1,357$2,06950
$2,069$3,15548

By state

The median cash price in each state, against the national median of $616.

Alaska: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureAKMaine: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMEVermont: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureVTNew Hampshire: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceNHWashington: median $766 across 10 hospitalsWA$766Idaho: 5 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureIDMontana: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceMTNorth Dakota: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureNDMinnesota: 4 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMNIllinois: median $665 across 34 hospitalsIL$665Wisconsin: median $291 across 36 hospitalsWI$291Michigan: median $92 across 12 hospitalsMI$92New York: median $294 across 17 hospitalsNY$294Massachusetts: 8 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMAOregon: median $208 across 10 hospitalsOR$208Nevada: 3 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureNVWyoming: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureWYSouth Dakota: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceSDIowa: median $42 across 14 hospitalsIA$42Indiana: median $1,395 across 20 hospitalsIN$1,395Ohio: median $325 across 51 hospitalsOH$325Pennsylvania: median $909 across 25 hospitalsPA$909New Jersey: 4 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureNJConnecticut: 6 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureCTRhode Island: 4 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureRICalifornia: median $813 across 82 hospitalsCA$813Utah: 6 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureUTColorado: median $308 across 23 hospitalsCO$308Nebraska: 5 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureNEMissouri: median $866 across 12 hospitalsMO$866Kentucky: median $2,619 across 10 hospitalsKY$2,619West Virginia: 6 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureWVVirginia: median $452 across 15 hospitalsVA$452Maryland: median $478 across 18 hospitalsMD$478Delaware: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureDEArizona: median $3,155 across 13 hospitalsAZ$3,155New Mexico: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureNMKansas: 4 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureKSArkansas: 3 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureARTennessee: median $452 across 10 hospitalsTN$452North Carolina: median $748 across 28 hospitalsNC$748South Carolina: 4 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureSCOklahoma: median $496 across 13 hospitalsOK$496Louisiana: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureLAMississippi: 9 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMSAlabama: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceALGeorgia: median $379 across 34 hospitalsGA$379Hawaii: 4 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureHITexas: median $553 across 64 hospitalsTX$553Florida: median $1,357 across 37 hospitalsFL$1,357
Cash price by state, most expensive first. National median $616. A state needs at least 10 hospitals with a usable price to show a figure.
StateHospitalsMedianvs national20th–80th
Arizona AZ13$3,155+413%$157 – $3,155
Kentucky KY10$2,619+325%$148 – $2,619
Indiana IN20$1,395+127%$789 – $2,103
Florida FL37$1,357+121%$214 – $2,075
Pennsylvania PA25$909+48%$492 – $2,764
Missouri MO12$866+41%$811 – $1,270
California CA82$813+32%$711 – $1,314
Washington WA10$766+24%$550 – $960
North Carolina NC28$748+22%$81 – $901
Illinois IL34$665+8%$449 – $796
Texas TX64$553−10%$343 – $1,895
Oklahoma OK13$496−19%$37 – $1,294
Maryland MD18$478−22%$248 – $580
Tennessee TN10$452−27%$452 – $452
Virginia VA15$452−27%$338 – $869
Georgia GA34$379−38%$294 – $379
Ohio OH51$325−47%$47 – $1,470
Colorado CO23$308−50%$61 – $360
New York NY17$294−52%$73 – $1,019
Wisconsin WI36$291−53%$238 – $728
Oregon OR10$208−66%$145 – $798
Michigan MI12$92−85%$92 – $4,438
Iowa IA14$42−93%$42 – $592
Mississippi MS9not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Massachusetts MA8not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Connecticut CT6not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Utah UT6not enough hospitals filed a usable price
West Virginia WV6not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Idaho ID5not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Nebraska NE5not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Hawaii HI4not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Kansas KS4not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Minnesota MN4not enough hospitals filed a usable price
New Jersey NJ4not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Rhode Island RI4not enough hospitals filed a usable price
South Carolina SC4not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Arkansas AR3not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Nevada NV3not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Alaska AK2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Louisiana LA2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Maine ME2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
New Mexico NM2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Vermont VT2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Delaware DE1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
North Dakota ND1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Wyoming WY1not enough hospitals filed a usable price

Hospitals like yours

The same distribution cut by the kind of hospital. Hospital type and ownership come from CMS; a hospital counts as part of a system when its price file is shared with at least one other hospital under the same brand. The national median is $616.

Cash price by hospital segment. A segment needs at least 20 hospitals to show a figure.
SegmentHospitalsMedian20th–80th
Hospital type
Acute care608$592$214 – $1,222
Children’s12fewer than 20 hospitals
Critical access50$616$291 – $2,103
Ownership
For-profit78$678$262 – $3,516
Government62$748$178 – $1,542
Non-profit530$580$214 – $1,222
System affiliation
Part of a system630$589$214 – $1,222
Independent46$760$198 – $1,895

Cash price vs list price

Median list price (chargemaster)$1,004
Median cash price$616
Cash as a share of list, median hospital60%

At the typical hospital, asking for the cash price cuts the list price by about 40%. The share is the median of each hospital’s own cash ÷ list ratio, over hospitals that filed both — not the ratio of the two medians above.

The same procedure, inpatient

517 hospitals filed a usable inpatient cash price for this code. The median is $577 and the average of the middle 60% is $602; most fall between $214 and $1,222.

Cash price percentiles, inpatient, across 517 hospitals. Each figure is a price a hospital filed. 10th: one in ten hospitals charges less; 25th: a quarter charge less; Median: half charge less; 75th: three quarters charge less; 90th: nine in ten charge less.
10th25thMedian75th90th
$73$294$577$986$1,703

The most expensive tenth of hospitals charges at least 23× what the cheapest tenth charges ($73 vs $1,703).

Of the 557 hospitals that filed this code inpatient, 517 gave a usable cash price; 25 carried a plausibility flag, 2 filed a number their own filing marks as not a price, 0 gave an estimate, and 13 a list price only.

How complete is this

676 of the 3,956 hospitals with a price file in our corpus (17%) filed a usable outpatient cash price for this code, and those are the hospitals every figure on this page is computed from.

What the 756 hospitals that filed this code at all gave us
Usable cash price — counted676
Cash price carrying a plausibility flag — shown on the compare tool, excluded here40
A number the filing itself marks as not a price (a placeholder, a ratio) — excluded2
An estimate rather than a filed cash price — excluded0
A list price only, no cash figure — excluded38
Hospitals that filed this code756

Sections not shown for this setting

  • Against Medicare: Medicare has no separately payable national outpatient (OPPS) rate for this code, so there is nothing honest to compare against.
  • Since our last snapshot: there is no earlier snapshot at least 90 days older than this one yet.

We last checked these hospitals’ price files for changes between September 4, 2026 and September 24, 2026; the figures were computed September 25, 2026 from filings loaded through September 24, 2026. The percentiles and averages use only the “counted” row.

Related procedures

Part of the Radioisotope scan and function studies family.

Hospitals file this code under descriptions such as Quantification of radioactive materials.

Method

Source
The machine-readable price files every U.S. hospital is required by CMS to publish, parsed per hospital. Nothing is surveyed, sampled or modelled.
What counts
One cash (self-pay) price per hospital for this code and setting. A hospital’s own filing can rule its number out — a placeholder, a “not applicable” note, a list price standing in for cash — and our plausibility checks can flag a price far below what every other hospital files. Both kinds are disclosed above and excluded from the statistics; on the compare tool a flagged price is still shown.
Statistics
Percentiles are discrete: each is a price some hospital filed. The average is the mean of the prices between the 20th and 80th percentiles. We never publish the plain mean, the minimum or the maximum. A state needs 10 hospitals and a segment 20 to show a figure; otherwise the row shows its count and no number. Medicare is the national unadjusted OPPS rate where one exists.
Names
Procedure names on these pages are our own plain-language titles, not the AMA’s copyrighted CPT descriptors. The code is the identity.

The full rules — sources, statistics, thresholds, limitations — are on the methodology page.

Download this page’s figures: JSON · CSV. Aggregates only — the per-hospital prices are on the compare tool.

Cite: HospitalRates.com, “Measurement of radioactive tracer uptake in one area (CPT 78835) — cash price report,” computed September 25, 2026. https://hospitalrates.com/procedures/cpt-78835-measurement-of-radioactive-tracer-uptake-in-one-area