Whiteville sees $485 in Medicaid billing for Pathology and Laboratory Procedures in 2024

Whiteville’s Medicaid providers reported $485 in billing for Pathology and Laboratory Procedures in 2024, according to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending data. The total was 227.7% higher than in 2023, when $148 in claims were filed for these services.

Medicaid is a public insurance program managed by individual states and funded jointly by federal and state governments. The program covers eligible low-income people, seniors, children, and individuals with disabilities and remains among the largest health care programs nationwide.

Since Medicaid payments use taxpayer dollars, local fluctuations in billing reflect how public funding supports health services at the community level.

The “Pathology and Laboratory Procedures” category includes a set of Medicaid-billed services determined by specific care types and categorized using HCPCS and CPT code groupings. For this review, each billing code was assigned to a single category via consistent prefixes and number segments, grouping related treatments together and avoiding overlaps or double counting across years.

Pathology and Laboratory Procedures represented the third-largest Medicaid payment category in Whiteville during 2024, part of increased spending in various service areas.

Statewide, this category placed sixth in Tennessee for total Medicaid payments in 2024.

From five years before 2024, Medicaid-paid Pathology and Laboratory Procedures in Whiteville rose by $485, or 0%. Certain intervals showed marked acceleration, with significant year-to-year growth in both 2022 and 2022.

Though spending on Pathology and Laboratory Procedures was distributed citywide, payments centered on a small group of ZIP codes. For 2024, ZIP code 38075 reported the highest local spending at $484. The leading ZIP code accounted for 99.9% of all Medicaid payments for this service in Whiteville.

Most of the Medicaid payments within this category were further concentrated among a handful of billing codes.

Comparatively, Whiteville’s 227.7% rise in Pathology and Laboratory Procedures Medicaid spending between 2023 and 2024 was far greater than the 48.2% citywide average increase for all Medicaid claim categories over the same time.

According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, combined federal and state Medicaid spending totaled approximately $871.7 billion in fiscal 2023, making up about 18% of the country’s health expenditures—rising from $613.5 billion in 2019 before COVID-19.

This amounts to nearly 40% growth over several years, attributable largely to expanded Medicaid enrollment and increased use during and after the pandemic.

Federal budget changes during the Trump administration included significant proposals to cut Medicaid funding and restructure the program. For instance, the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” signed in 2025, is expected to reduce federal Medicaid spending by over $1 trillion over 10 years, adding measures such as work requirements and more cost-sharing, potentially affecting coverage and program resources for some enrollees. States are likely to assume a greater share of overall costs, narrowing access to federal funding, even as Medicaid continues to cover tens of millions of people 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.