Knee Arthroscopy Cost in Massachusetts
Arthrs kne srg mnisectmy m/l
$3,859Hospital outpatient total2026 Medicare, physician + facility- ✓Your ZIP's wage-adjusted hospital and surgery centre rates
- ✓Five nearby hospitals by name, with CMS star ratings
- ✓The add-on codes that typically land on the bill
- ✓A word-for-word script for asking for a good-faith estimate
- ✓A private link you can reopen and share
- ✓Everything in the Premium report
- ✓15 nearby hospitals instead of five
- ✓Filled good-faith-estimate request letter
- ✓Bill-negotiation letter
- ✓Printable PDF download
Massachusetts Medicare physician rate (2026)
+5.6% vs nationalAverage of 2 localities. Office range $522.61–$566.54.
What the whole procedure costs
The rate above is the physician’s fee on its own. The facility bills separately, and for most procedures the facility is the larger half of the bill. These are 2026 national Medicare amounts.
Choosing a surgery centre over a hospital saves about $1,698 on the Medicare allowed amount for knee arthroscopy. Ask whether your procedure can be done at an ambulatory surgery centre.
Medicare pays the hospital a single comprehensive amount for this procedure, covering the facility's share of the encounter including implants and supplies. Medicare allowed amounts are not what an uninsured patient is charged, and not a quote. Private plans typically allow more.
Your ZIP in Massachusetts
Look up your ZIP to see whether metro Boston or rest-of-state pricing applies, from Boston and Cambridge to Worcester, Springfield, the North and South Shores, and Cape Cod.
What knee arthroscopy costs at hospitals near you
Everything above is a national average. The hospital you pick in Massachusetts moves the bill more than anything else you control.
Rates for your ZIP, 5 named hospitals with CMS ratings, the add-on codes, and the scheduler script.
One-off payment, no account and no subscription. You get a private link and an email. No medical records and no insurance card, ever.
What these numbers are
Every figure on this page is a 2026 Medicare allowed amount: the physician line comes from the Physician Fee Schedule adjusted by geographic practice-cost indices, and the facility totals come from the CMS hospital outpatient (OPPS) and ambulatory surgery centre rates. None of them is a hospital chargemaster price, your insurer's contracted rate, or a quote. Anesthesia, pathology, imaging reads and follow-up care are billed under their own codes when they apply, and an inpatient stay is paid a different way again.
National vs Massachusetts
Where Massachusetts ranks for this CPT
CPT 29881 by Massachusetts locality
| Locality | Office |
|---|---|
| metropolitan boston | $566.54 |
| rest of massachusetts | $522.61 |
PE GPCI ranges from 1.053 to 1.194 in Massachusetts. That index is why the same CPT is not one price statewide.
Knee Arthroscopy and how Massachusetts is priced
Massachusetts is priced through two localities: metro Boston and the rest of the state. Boston's locality carries clearly higher geographic adjustments, reflecting some of the highest medical wages and office costs in the nation, while Worcester, Springfield, and the Cape share the lower rest-of-state factors. The split means the fee schedule itself acknowledges what everyone in the state already knows about Boston prices. Even so, rest-of-state Massachusetts still prices above most of the country.
Boston has arguably the densest concentration of academic medical centers anywhere, and its teaching hospitals pull referrals from all of New England and beyond. That prestige comes with a high-cost market structure that state policymakers have scrutinized for years. Western Massachusetts operates more like a regional market centered on Springfield, and Cape and islands residents contend with seasonal capacity strain.
This procedure: Knee arthroscopy with meniscectomy is keyhole surgery in which the surgeon inserts a small camera into the knee and trims away the torn portion of the meniscus, the cartilage shock absorber between the bones. It treats meniscal tears causing pain, catching, or locking. The procedure takes 30 to 60 minutes under general or regional anesthesia at an outpatient surgery center, and most patients walk the same day and return to desk work within days.
What Is Knee Arthroscopy?
Knee arthroscopy with meniscectomy is keyhole surgery in which the surgeon inserts a small camera into the knee and trims away the torn portion of the meniscus, the cartilage shock absorber between the bones. It treats meniscal tears causing pain, catching, or locking. The procedure takes 30 to 60 minutes under general or regional anesthesia at an outpatient surgery center, and most patients walk the same day and return to desk work within days.
What Affects the Cost
- –Ambulatory surgery centers typically charge far less for this procedure than hospital outpatient departments.
- –A meniscus repair with sutures, if the tear pattern allows one, is a different code with a longer recovery and different pricing than simple trimming.
- –The pre-operative MRI that diagnosed the tear is part of the true episode cost and may still be working through your deductible.
- –Post-operative physical therapy visits, often 4 to 12 of them, are billed per visit on top of the surgery.
- –Anesthesia bills separately, and a regional nerve block for pain control adds a line item.
- –Any additional work done through the scope at the same time, such as cartilage smoothing, can add or change surgical codes.
Questions to Ask Before Booking
- 1.Is my tear traumatic or degenerative, and would a course of physical therapy first be a reasonable and cheaper option?
- 2.Will this be a meniscectomy or a repair, and how do the costs and recovery differ?
- 3.Can we book this at a freestanding surgery center rather than the hospital?
- 4.What other procedures might you perform once you are inside the knee, and how would they change the bill?
- 5.How many therapy visits will I need afterward and at what cost per visit?
Other featured procedures in Massachusetts
Knee Arthroscopy in other states
Knee Arthroscopy in Massachusetts: questions
The 2026 Medicare physician office rate for CPT 29881 averages $544.58 across 2 Massachusetts localities, from $522.61 in REST OF MASSACHUSETTS to $566.54 in METROPOLITAN BOSTON. The hospital physician rate averages $544.58. Enter a ZIP for the exact locality.
Yes. CMS splits Massachusetts into 2 payment localities. For this CPT the office physician fee spans $43.93 from the lowest to highest locality. Look up your ZIP to see whether metro Boston or rest-of-state pricing applies, from Boston and Cambridge to Worcester, Springfield, the North and South Shores, and Cape Cod.
After the Part B deductible, coinsurance is usually 20% of the allowed amount: about $109 for the office physician line or $109 for the hospital physician line in Massachusetts. Medigap may cover that 20%. This is not the hospital facility fee.
No. $544.58 is only the physician's share. Adding Medicare's facility payment brings the total to about $3,859 in a hospital outpatient department, or about $2,161 at an ambulatory surgery centre. Anesthesia, pathology and other codes billed the same day are extra. Massachusetts ranks #42 of 51 states on the physician line (6% above the national office rate of $515.71).