Impact of MR imaging on nationwide health care costs and comparison with other imaging procedures

OBJECTIVE. We wished to determine the extent to which MR imaging contributes to the overall costs of imaging in the United States and to compare MR imaging costs with other imaging techniques. MATERIALS AND METHODS. All 23 current procedural terminology, version 4 (CPT4) codes for MR imaging were extracted from the national 1993 Part B Medicare annual data reimbursement file. For each code, we calculated total Medicare physician reimbursements. Aggregate reimbursement for all MR imaging was compared with aggregate reimbursement for all 659 imaging-related current procedural terminology, version 4 codes and also with comparable figures for echocardiography and other categories of cardiovascular imaging. RESULTS. Within the 23 MR imaging codes, 1,449,911 examinations were performed on Medicare patients in 1993, for which physicians were reimbursed $370 million. Medicare reimbursement of physicians for all 659 imaging-related procedures was $5.3 billion. Thus, MR imaging accounted for only 7% of all imaging costs. By comparison, a group of just 10 imaging codes, which are primarily cardiovascular in nature, accounted for $1.67 billion, or 32% of the entire Part B costs for imaging. Reimbursements for echocardiography alone are more than twice those for MR imaging. CONCLUSION. From the national perspective, MR imaging does not appear to warrant its reputation as a costly procedure. The costs of echocardiography and other imaging related to the cardiovascular system are considerably higher.