HRHospitalRates.comCompare prices

Procedure price report

Chromatography test measuring one substance

CPT 82491the billing code this page is about

A laboratory column chromatography test that measures the amount of a single substance in a sample; billed once per substance measured.

Hospitals typically charge $84 cash for this outpatient procedure — the median across 103 hospitals that filed a usable cash price; the average of the middle 60% is $92. Most fall between $43 and $183 (20th–80th percentile).

Hospitals
103
States
30
Filings dated
Aug 2022 – 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 103 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
$36$46$84$165$232

The most expensive tenth of hospitals charges at least 6.4× what the cheapest tenth charges ($36 vs $232).

How the prices are spread

$24 – $31: 6 hospitals$24$31 – $40: 4 hospitals$40 – $52: 17 hospitals$40$52 – $67: 13 hospitals$67 – $87: 9 hospitals$67$87 – $113: 8 hospitals$113 – $146: 12 hospitals$113$146 – $188: 10 hospitals$188 – $243: 10 hospitals$188$243 – $314: 5 hospitals$243median $84price bands are equal on a log scale
Hospitals per price band (94 of 103 — the bands cover the 5th to 95th percentile)
FromToHospitals
$24$316
$31$404
$40$5217
$52$6713
$67$879
$87$1138
$113$14612
$146$18810
$188$24310
$243$3145

By state

The median cash price in each state, against the national median of $84.

Alaska: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceAKMaine: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMEVermont: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceVTNew Hampshire: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceNHWashington: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceWAIdaho: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureIDMontana: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMTNorth Dakota: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceNDMinnesota: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceMNIllinois: median $180 across 16 hospitalsIL$180Wisconsin: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceWIMichigan: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMINew York: 6 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureNYMassachusetts: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceMAOregon: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureORNevada: 1 hospital 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: 4 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureIAIndiana: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceINOhio: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureOHPennsylvania: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figurePANew Jersey: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceNJConnecticut: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceCTRhode Island: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceRICalifornia: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureCAUtah: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceUTColorado: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureCONebraska: 3 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureNEMissouri: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMOKentucky: 3 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureKYWest Virginia: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureWVVirginia: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceVAMaryland: 5 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMDDelaware: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceDEArizona: 4 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureAZNew Mexico: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceNMKansas: 7 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureKSArkansas: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureARTennessee: 3 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureTNNorth Carolina: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureNCSouth Carolina: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceSCOklahoma: median $43 across 13 hospitalsOK$43Louisiana: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceLAMississippi: 1 hospital filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureMSAlabama: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureALGeorgia: 6 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureGAHawaii: no hospital in the corpus filed a usable priceHITexas: 6 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureTXFlorida: 2 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureFL
Cash price by state, most expensive first. National median $84. A state needs at least 10 hospitals with a usable price to show a figure.
StateHospitalsMedianvs national20th–80th
Illinois IL16$180+116%$24 – $251
Oklahoma OK13$43−49%$43 – $48
Kansas KS7not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Georgia GA6not enough hospitals filed a usable price
New York NY6not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Texas TX6not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Maryland MD5not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Arizona AZ4not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Iowa IA4not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Kentucky KY3not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Nebraska NE3not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Tennessee TN3not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Alabama AL2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
California CA2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Colorado CO2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Florida FL2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Michigan MI2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Missouri MO2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Montana MT2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Oregon OR2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Pennsylvania PA2not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Arkansas AR1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Idaho ID1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Maine ME1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Mississippi MS1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
North Carolina NC1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Nevada NV1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
Ohio OH1not enough hospitals filed a usable price
West Virginia WV1not 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 $84.

Cash price by hospital segment. A segment needs at least 20 hospitals to show a figure.
SegmentHospitalsMedian20th–80th
Hospital type
Acute care52$62$43 – $165
Children’s5fewer than 20 hospitals
Critical access46$110$64 – $183
Ownership
For-profit11fewer than 20 hospitals
Government34$102$48 – $155
Non-profit58$84$43 – $200
System affiliation
Part of a system67$77$43 – $200
Independent36$110$48 – $166

Cash price vs list price

Median list price (chargemaster)$116
Median cash price$84
Cash as a share of list, median hospital75%

At the typical hospital, asking for the cash price cuts the list price by about 25%. 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.

How complete is this

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

What the 125 hospitals that filed this code at all gave us
Usable cash price — counted103
Cash price carrying a plausibility flag — shown on the compare tool, excluded here11
A number the filing itself marks as not a price (a placeholder, a ratio) — excluded0
An estimate rather than a filed cash price — excluded0
A list price only, no cash figure — excluded11
Hospitals that filed this code125

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 23, 2026. The percentiles and averages use only the “counted” row.

Hospitals file this code under descriptions such as Other Professional.

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, “Chromatography test measuring one substance (CPT 82491) — cash price report,” computed September 25, 2026. https://hospitalrates.com/procedures/cpt-82491-chromatography-test-measuring-one-substance