G0444 Medicaid reimbursement rate by state (2026)

• Order. States are listed from the highest published rate to the lowest. No single unit is shared by 8 or more states for G0444, so the order is by published amount and is not a like-for-like rank.
• Medicaid rate. The most the state's fee-for-service program pays for one unit, as published. 9 of the 14 states list more than one rate for G0444, by modifier, provider type or setting; the table shows the one that matches the provider level and setting used across states, without add-ons.
• Unit. Of the 14 states, 1 publish G0444 per unit, and 13 schedules print no unit at all (a flat amount per service).
• Per hour. G0444 is not billed in time units in these states, so no hourly figure is shown.
• Managed-care plans. The rule the state sets for its plans on this rate. What each rule means is explained below.
• % of Medicare. Medicare amounts exist for G0444, but no state's Medicaid unit matches Medicare's billing unit closely enough to compute a percentage.
• Source and date. Each Source link opens the state's own document; “since” is the date the rate took effect.

Published rates for G0444 run from $1.57 in Kansas to $26.36 in New Mexico, a 16.8x gap in the same unit. Half the states pay more than the median of $14.68 and half pay less. The usual reasons for a spread like this in behavioral health rates:

• States add enhanced rates for crisis services, certified community behavioral health clinics and integrated care that sit outside the base schedule.
• Community mental health and substance use services are often billed under H and T codes that each state defines for itself, so the same code can describe a different service in two states.
• Behavioral health is frequently run through a separate state agency, a carve-out or a specialty plan, with its own rate-setting cycle.

Timing matters too. 8 states set the current rate for G0444 in 2026 or later, while 4 states still pay a rate that took effect in 2022 or earlier. A state that has not updated its rate in years will drift down the ranking as others raise theirs.

No managed-care plan publishes what it pays for G0444. What is public is the rule each state's plan contracts set, and that rule decides how much the published rate matters when you contract with a plan.

In 6 states, the published rate binds plans: a floor, a pass-through or a state-set rate. In 3 states, plans negotiate and the published rate is a benchmark or out-of-network default. The rule for the remaining 5 states is not classified yet.

• Plans must pay at least the published rate (6 states). The published rate is your floor. Negotiate up from it, and if a plan pays less, the contract provision is the basis for a payment dispute.
• Plans negotiate; the published rate applies out of network (3 states). In-network rates can be above or below the published rate. The published rate is the benchmark both sides know, and the fallback if no contract is signed.

Plan-negotiated rates are never estimated here. To see the rule and its citation for a particular state, open that state's managed-care page, for example New Mexico managed care.

G0444 is a HCPCS Level II professional services code in the behavioral health line, billed mostly by psychiatrists, psychologists, licensed clinicians and community mental health agencies. G codes describe professional services and procedures that have no CPT code, or that payers define more narrowly. Many are timed, so check the unit before comparing.

Psychotherapy codes are defined by session length, so one unit is one session of the stated duration; H codes are billed in whatever unit the state defines, often 15 minutes, an hour or a day. Modifiers such as HO (master's level), HN (bachelor's level) and HP (doctoral level) identify the practitioner, and many states publish a different rate for each.

Medicare's 2026 physician fee schedule pays $17.27–$21.27 for G0444 (non-facility), depending on the Medicare locality. That is a useful reference point, but Medicare and Medicaid can define the unit differently, so compare only where the units match.

Before billing, confirm the rate, unit and any modifier with the state's current schedule or the plan: the amounts here are as published, not a guarantee of payment.