Q5151 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 Q5151, 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 29 states list more than one rate for Q5151, 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 29 states, 1 publish Q5151 per 2 mg, and 28 schedules print no unit at all (a flat amount per service).
• Per hour. Q5151 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. No Medicare physician fee schedule amount is on file for Q5151, so there is no percentage.
• Source and date. Each Source link opens the state's own document; “since” is the date the rate took effect.

Published rates for Q5151 run from $1.00 in New Jersey to $34.70 in Arkansas, a 34.7x gap in the same unit. Half the states pay more than the median of $31.55 and half pay less. The usual reasons for a spread like this in physician & professional rates:

• Many schedules pay differently by place of service (office versus facility) and by practitioner, and nurse practitioners and physician assistants are often paid a percentage of the physician amount.
• Primary-care and pediatric add-ons, enhanced rates for certain specialties and targeted increases for access problems change individual codes without moving the rest of the schedule.
• Modifiers such as professional or technical component, bilateral, multiple procedure and assistant at surgery change the amount paid, and states apply them with their own percentages.

Timing matters too. 26 states set the current rate for Q5151 in 2026 or later. A state that has not updated its rate in years will drift down the ranking as others raise theirs.

What a plan pays for Q5151 is negotiated privately, but the state decides how much room there is to negotiate. Here is how the rules break down across the 29 states.

In 3 states, the published rate binds plans: a floor, a pass-through or a state-set rate. In 16 states, plans negotiate and the published rate is a benchmark or out-of-network default. The rule for the remaining 10 states is not classified yet.

• Plans negotiate; the published rate applies out of network (16 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.
• Plans must pay at least the published rate (2 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.
• The state sets the plan rate (1 state). There is little to negotiate on price. Contracting is about network participation, authorization and billing terms.

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 Arkansas managed care.

Q5151 is a HCPCS Level II temporary code in the physician & professional line, billed mostly by physicians, nurse practitioners, physician assistants and other licensed practitioners. Q codes are temporary codes for drugs, biologicals, supplies and services. The unit depends on the code and is often a dose or an item.

Physician-fee-schedule codes are billed per service: one unit is one occurrence unless the code itself is defined by time or quantity. Where a state publishes separate facility and non-facility amounts, the non-facility (office) amount is usually higher because the practice carries the overhead.

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.