Medicaid payments for Camden’s pathology and laboratory procedures climb to $14,789 in 2024

Data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database indicate that providers in Camden billed $14,789 in 2024 for Pathology and Laboratory Procedures, representing a rise from $13,539 in claims for these services in 2023—an increase of 9.2%.

Medicaid, a public health insurance initiative administered by states and jointly financed by federal and state governments, provides coverage to low-income groups, including individuals, families, children, seniors, and people living with disabilities, making it a major component of the country’s health system.

Because taxpayer resources fund Medicaid disbursements, altered billing volumes locally demonstrate how a community’s health care resources are allocated.

The “Pathology and Laboratory Procedures” grouping covers various Medicaid-billed services classified by care type, utilizing standardized HCPCS and CPT coding schemes. This review assigned each billing code to a single category via consistent code ranges and prefixes, enabling related services to be collectively analyzed—reducing double counts and maintaining accurate year-over-year position within payment rankings.

Medicaid expenditures grew among several service types, and in 2024, Pathology and Laboratory Procedures emerged as the third-highest category in Camden by total Medicaid disbursements.

This category likewise ranked third by total Medicaid payments for Alabama statewide in 2024.

Reviewing a five-year window leading to 2024, Medicaid payments in Camden associated with the Pathology and Laboratory Procedures category climbed $695, or 4.9%. Payment growth rates picked up during multiple years, particularly in 2021 and 2022 which saw marked increases.

Although spending in the Pathology and Laboratory Procedures category occurred throughout Camden, it was heavily focused in a small range of ZIP codes. In 2024, the top ZIP code by Medicaid payments—36726—accumulated a total of $14,788, representing all the city’s category spending that year.

Medicaid billing within the Pathology and Laboratory Procedures category was further narrowed into a small number of specific individual codes.

By comparison, Pathology and Laboratory Procedures saw Medicaid payments grow 9.2% from 2023 to 2024 in Camden, while all healthcare service categories in the city experienced a broader 16.9% change during this period.

According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, combined spending on Medicaid by federal and state sources reached around $871.7 billion in fiscal year 2023—a share of about 18% of nationwide health expenditures—up notably from about $613.5 billion in 2019, prior to the COVID-19 public health emergency.

This sharp rise, approximately 40% within several years, has been primarily fueled by growing enrollments and higher use of services during and beyond the pandemic.

In recent years, federal budget packages during the Trump presidency have featured proposals potentially reducing federal outlays to Medicaid and restructuring how the program is managed. The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” enacted in 2025, is forecast to decrease federal Medicaid spending by over $1 trillion in the coming decade and to introduce policies—like greater cost-sharing and work mandates—that may reduce access for some program participants. These adjustments are expected to shift a greater financial burden to the states and restrain growth in federal Medicaid funding, while service demand remains high for millions.

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.