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Procedure price report · Other Laboratory

Cell count with differential on body fluid

CPT 89051the billing code this page is about

Laboratory count of the cells in a body fluid other than blood, such as joint, chest, or spinal fluid, including a breakdown of the cell types present.

Hospitals typically charge $66 cash for this outpatient procedure — the median across 3,256 hospitals that filed a usable cash price; the average of the middle 60% is $70. Most fall between $26 and $140 (20th–80th percentile).

Hospitals
3,256
States
50
Filings dated
Mar 2023 – Sep 2026
Computed
September 25, 2026
Prices checked
through September 25, 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 3,256 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
$15$33$66$120$221

The most expensive tenth of hospitals charges at least 15× what the cheapest tenth charges ($15 vs $221).

How the prices are spread

$9 – $13: 132 hospitals$9$13 – $19: 168 hospitals$19 – $27: 239 hospitals$19$27 – $40: 313 hospitals$40 – $57: 447 hospitals$40$57 – $83: 537 hospitals$83 – $120: 448 hospitals$83$120 – $174: 339 hospitals$174 – $252: 218 hospitals$174$252 – $364: 92 hospitals$252median $66price bands are equal on a log scale
Hospitals per price band (2,933 of 3,256 — the bands cover the 5th to 95th percentile)
FromToHospitals
$9$13132
$13$19168
$19$27239
$27$40313
$40$57447
$57$83537
$83$120448
$120$174339
$174$252218
$252$36492

By state

The median cash price in each state, against the national median of $66.

Alaska: median $86 across 18 hospitalsAK$86Maine: median $49 across 27 hospitalsME$49Vermont: median $61 across 13 hospitalsVT$61New Hampshire: median $49 across 25 hospitalsNH$49Washington: median $54 across 75 hospitalsWA$54Idaho: median $39 across 24 hospitalsID$39Montana: median $63 across 23 hospitalsMT$63North Dakota: median $47 across 31 hospitalsND$47Minnesota: median $74 across 102 hospitalsMN$74Illinois: median $90 across 139 hospitalsIL$90Wisconsin: median $69 across 107 hospitalsWI$69Michigan: median $43 across 89 hospitalsMI$43New York: median $30 across 105 hospitalsNY$30Massachusetts: median $48 across 51 hospitalsMA$48Oregon: median $68 across 48 hospitalsOR$68Nevada: median $61 across 21 hospitalsNV$61Wyoming: median $58 across 16 hospitalsWY$58South Dakota: median $102 across 33 hospitalsSD$102Iowa: median $58 across 87 hospitalsIA$58Indiana: median $78 across 95 hospitalsIN$78Ohio: median $64 across 141 hospitalsOH$64Pennsylvania: median $41 across 119 hospitalsPA$41New Jersey: median $6 across 56 hospitalsNJ$6Connecticut: median $30 across 22 hospitalsCT$30Rhode Island: median $43 across 10 hospitalsRI$43California: median $93 across 157 hospitalsCA$93Utah: median $144 across 39 hospitalsUT$144Colorado: median $110 across 71 hospitalsCO$110Nebraska: median $118 across 78 hospitalsNE$118Missouri: median $57 across 71 hospitalsMO$57Kentucky: median $68 across 66 hospitalsKY$68West Virginia: median $43 across 38 hospitalsWV$43Virginia: median $55 across 72 hospitalsVA$55Maryland: median $66 across 41 hospitalsMD$66Delaware: 7 hospitals filed a usable price — fewer than 10, so no figureDEArizona: median $91 across 42 hospitalsAZ$91New Mexico: median $75 across 30 hospitalsNM$75Kansas: median $57 across 89 hospitalsKS$57Arkansas: median $28 across 38 hospitalsAR$28Tennessee: median $41 across 80 hospitalsTN$41North Carolina: median $89 across 82 hospitalsNC$89South Carolina: median $116 across 53 hospitalsSC$116Oklahoma: median $56 across 71 hospitalsOK$56Louisiana: median $30 across 51 hospitalsLA$30Mississippi: median $32 across 52 hospitalsMS$32Alabama: median $43 across 42 hospitalsAL$43Georgia: median $59 across 100 hospitalsGA$59Hawaii: median $45 across 21 hospitalsHI$45Texas: median $101 across 239 hospitalsTX$101Florida: median $191 across 149 hospitalsFL$191
Cash price by state, most expensive first. National median $66. A state needs at least 10 hospitals with a usable price to show a figure.
StateHospitalsMedianvs national20th–80th
Florida FL149$191+190%$22 – $579
Utah UT39$144+119%$86 – $169
Nebraska NE78$118+79%$47 – $164
South Carolina SC53$116+76%$45 – $153
Colorado CO71$110+67%$51 – $252
South Dakota SD33$102+55%$78 – $153
Texas TX239$101+54%$42 – $229
California CA157$93+41%$48 – $264
Arizona AZ42$91+39%$13 – $363
Illinois IL139$90+37%$49 – $165
North Carolina NC82$89+36%$45 – $124
Alaska AK18$86+31%$16 – $177
Indiana IN95$78+19%$22 – $130
New Mexico NM30$75+14%$39 – $129
Minnesota MN102$74+13%$41 – $105
Wisconsin WI107$69+5%$40 – $84
Kentucky KY66$68+3%$38 – $133
Oregon OR48$68+3%$38 – $104
Maryland MD41$66+1%$50 – $81
Ohio OH141$64−2%$25 – $146
Montana MT23$63−4%$26 – $93
Vermont VT13$61−7%$43 – $143
Nevada NV21$61−7%$17 – $115
Georgia GA100$59−10%$17 – $103
Iowa IA87$58−12%$35 – $88
Wyoming WY16$58−12%$13 – $143
Kansas KS89$57−13%$37 – $107
Missouri MO71$57−14%$39 – $94
Oklahoma OK71$56−15%$20 – $103
Virginia VA72$55−16%$23 – $194
Washington WA75$54−18%$30 – $108
New Hampshire NH25$49−25%$30 – $113
Maine ME27$49−25%$27 – $161
Massachusetts MA51$48−27%$19 – $81
North Dakota ND31$47−28%$37 – $89
Hawaii HI21$45−32%$28 – $50
Michigan MI89$43−34%$20 – $70
Rhode Island RI10$43−34%$15 – $147
Alabama AL42$43−35%$18 – $139
West Virginia WV38$43−35%$22 – $62
Tennessee TN80$41−38%$11 – $93
Pennsylvania PA119$41−38%$10 – $109
Idaho ID24$39−41%$25 – $137
Mississippi MS52$32−51%$15 – $54
New York NY105$30−54%$12 – $96
Louisiana LA51$30−55%$13 – $70
Connecticut CT22$30−55%$20 – $61
Arkansas AR38$28−57%$18 – $34
New Jersey NJ56$6−90%$6 – $20
Delaware DE7not 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 $66.

Cash price by hospital segment. A segment needs at least 20 hospitals to show a figure.
SegmentHospitalsMedian20th–80th
Hospital type
Acute care2,271$66$23 – $153
Children’s64$73$34 – $171
Critical access911$65$29 – $113
Ownership
For-profit464$101$34 – $449
Government609$67$26 – $118
Non-profit2,173$62$25 – $127
System affiliation
Part of a system2,647$68$26 – $146
Independent609$58$25 – $114

Cash price vs list price

Median list price (chargemaster)$109
Median cash price$66
Cash as a share of list, median hospital65%

At the typical hospital, asking for the cash price cuts the list price by about 35%. 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

2,204 hospitals filed a usable inpatient cash price for this code. The median is $68 and the average of the middle 60% is $72; most fall between $28 and $143.

Cash price percentiles, inpatient, across 2,204 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
$15$35$68$124$198

The most expensive tenth of hospitals charges at least 13× what the cheapest tenth charges ($15 vs $198).

Of the 2,427 hospitals that filed this code inpatient, 2,204 gave a usable cash price; 119 carried a plausibility flag, 0 filed a number their own filing marks as not a price, 0 gave an estimate, and 104 a list price only.

How complete is this

3,256 of the 3,956 hospitals with a price file in our corpus (82%) filed a usable outpatient cash price for this code, and those are the hospitals every figure on this page is computed from.

What the 3,548 hospitals that filed this code at all gave us
Usable cash price — counted3,256
Cash price carrying a plausibility flag — shown on the compare tool, excluded here167
A number the filing itself marks as not a price (a placeholder, a ratio) — excluded0
An estimate rather than a filed cash price — excluded1
A list price only, no cash figure — excluded124
Hospitals that filed this code3,548

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 25, 2026; the figures were computed September 25, 2026 from filings loaded through September 25, 2026. The percentiles and averages use only the “counted” row.

Related procedures

Part of the Other Laboratory family.

Hospitals file this code under descriptions such as HC Cell Count W/Diff-CSF.

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, “Cell count with differential on body fluid (CPT 89051) — cash price report,” computed September 25, 2026. https://hospitalrates.com/procedures/cpt-89051-cell-count-with-differential-on-body-fluid