San Luis Medicaid payments for surgery rise to $6,546 in 2024

In 2024, Medicaid providers in San Luis claimed $6,546 under the Surgery category, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database. This represents a 90.6% increase over 2023, when $3,434 in claims were recorded for the category.

Medicaid is a public health insurance system overseen by states and funded by both federal and state governments. This program serves low-income Americans as well as seniors, children, and individuals with disabilities, making it one of the major components of the nation’s health system.

Since taxpayer funds support Medicaid, shifts in the amount billed locally provide insights into how health care dollars are spent in a specific community.

The “Surgery” category includes a set of Medicaid services defined by type of care, based on established HCPCS and CPT coding structures. For this article, code assignments were applied consistently to each service, using code prefixes and number ranges, to maintain proper grouping and prevent counting the same payment more than once.

Medicaid payments increased in several areas; however, Surgery placed seventh by total Medicaid payments among San Luis service categories in 2024.

On a statewide level, Surgery ranked ninth by total Medicaid payments in Arizona in 2024.

Between 2020 and 2024, Medicaid payments for services in the Surgery category rose by $5,197, a 385.1% increase overall. Spending growth was particularly significant in some years, including 2021 and 2023, which saw marked year-over-year jumps.

Surgery-related Medicaid payments were spread throughout San Luis, yet the majority were concentrated in only a few ZIP codes. In 2024, ZIP code 85349 accounted for $5,788, while 85336 represented $757. Combined, these 2 ZIP codes made up 100% of Surgery category Medicaid payments in the city for 2024.

Within the Surgery category itself, a small subset of service codes received most of the Medicaid payments.

Comparatively, the 90.6% increase in San Luis Medicaid payments under the Surgery category between 2024 and 2023 outpaced the overall 10.3% rise for all Medicaid claim categories in the city over the same period.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services reports that total federal and state Medicaid spending reached about $871.7 billion in fiscal year 2023, equaling approximately 18% of the nation’s health expenditures, up sharply from around $613.5 billion in 2019, the year prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The data show growth of about 40% over several years, mainly due to larger enrollment and heightened use of services during and following the pandemic period.

Under federal budget changes enacted during the Trump administration, major alterations to Medicaid funding were introduced. Legislation such as the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” signed in 2025, is projected to reduce federal Medicaid spending by more than $1 trillion through the next decade, while adding work requirements and greater cost-sharing responsibilities for some. These policy updates could limit coverage and lower federal support, requiring states to take on a greater share of program costs as Medicaid continues to help tens of millions nationwide.

Note: HCPCS codes are presented for context inside the category. Article category totals and rankings use standardized service groupings and not individual billing codes.

This report draws on U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database. Access the original data here.