Blountville posts $64 in Medicaid Surgery payments for 2024, up 88% from prior year

Blountville health care providers received $64 in Medicaid payments for services grouped under the Surgery category in 2024, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database. This represented an 88.2% increase from the previous year, when $34 in claims were submitted for the same category of care.

Medicaid is a nationwide public health insurance program operated by states and jointly funded by federal and state governments. It supports low-income families, seniors, children, and people with disabilities, and is one of the largest parts of the national health care system.

Since Medicaid payments are derived from taxpayer resources, fluctuations in local billing reveal how public health care funding is distributed within a community.

The Surgery category consists of Medicaid-billed services defined by care type, organized using standardized HCPCS and CPT code groups. This analysis matched each billing code to one service category using uniform code prefixes and numerical ranges, allowing for accurate grouping and consistent ranking over time while preventing double counting.

Across various service types, Medicaid spending rose, with Surgery standing as the eighth-largest category in Blountville by total Medicaid payments in 2024.

Statewide in Tennessee, Surgery ranked 10th by total Medicaid payments in 2024.

In the five years before 2024, Blountville’s Medicaid payments for Surgery services rose by $64, or 0%. Spending growth was higher during certain intervals, with significant year-over-year increases reported in 2022 and 2022.

Surgery-related Medicaid spending was not evenly distributed across Blountville; most payments were concentrated in a few ZIP codes. In 2024, ZIP code 37617 led with $63, so the top 1 ZIP codes made up 99.5% of all Surgery-related Medicaid payments that year in the city.

Within the Surgery grouping, Medicaid reimbursement was also focused on a few specific billing codes.

For context, Surgery Medicaid payments in Blountville surged 88.2% between 2024 and 2023, compared with a 31.6% overall change across all Medicaid claim categories in the city for the same span.

According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, federal and state Medicaid spending combined reached about $871.7 billion in fiscal year 2023, making up around 18% of total U.S. health spending, a sharp rise from $613.5 billion in 2019 prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This increase marks roughly 40% growth over a few years, mainly resulting from expanded enrollment and greater use of services during and after the pandemic.

Federal budget legislation during the Trump administration included substantial proposals to decrease federal Medicaid funding and alter the program’s structure. The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” enacted in 2025, is expected to reduce federal Medicaid spending by more than $1 trillion over the next 10 years and introduces policies like work requirements and higher cost-sharing that could cut coverage and funding for certain beneficiaries. These adjustments are expected to shift additional costs to states and restrain federal Medicaid spending growth, even as the program continues serving millions across the nation.

Note: HCPCS codes are shown for context within the category. Category totals and rankings in this article are based on standardized service groupings rather than individual billing codes.

Information in this article was obtained from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database. The source data can be found here.