Chico Medicaid bills for Evaluation and Management services climb to $14 million in 2024

In 2024, Medicaid providers in Chico billed $14,191,597 for services within the Evaluation and Management category, according to data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database. This figure represents a 47.7% jump from 2023, when providers submitted $9,611,166 in claims for these services.

Medicaid, operated by individual states with both federal and state funding in partnership, provides health insurance for low-income individuals, families, children, seniors and people with disabilities, forming a core component of the U.S. health care infrastructure.

Since Medicaid uses taxpayer dollars, shifts in local billing levels reflect how public health care resources are distributed within communities.

The “Evaluation and Management” classification covers services defined by care type, grouped using standardized HCPCS and CPT billing codes. For this report, consistent prefixes and numeric code segments assigned each claim to a single category, so similar services could be analyzed together while also preventing double counting and maintaining accurate year-over-year rankings.

Although other Medicaid service categories also experienced spending growth, Evaluation and Management ranked third among medicoid categories by total payment level in Chico during 2024.

Across California, Evaluation and Management placed second statewide in 2024 based on total Medicaid payments.

Over the five years ending in 2024, Medicaid expenditures connected to Evaluation and Management in Chico grew by $10,777,183, or 315.6%. The pace of spending increase accelerated at specific points, with large annual gains registered in 2023 and 2021.

These Evaluation and Management expenditures occurred citywide but were primarily gathered in a small number of ZIP codes. In 2024, ZIP code 95926 led with $12,626,853, followed by 95973 with $982,785 and 95928 with $581,958. Combined, these 3 ZIP codes represented 100% of Chico’s Medicaid Evaluation and Management outlays for the year.

Furthermore, only a select group of billing codes accounted for most Medicaid payments in this category.

In comparative terms, payments linked to Evaluation and Management in Chico grew 47.7% between 2024 and 2023, while overall Medicaid claims in the city posted a 0.1% increase over the same interval.

According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, the combined state and federal Medicaid spending reached around $871.7 billion in the 2023 fiscal year, totaling about 18% of total national health expenditures—a substantial rise from nearly $613.5 billion in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic.

This jump equates to an increase of roughly 40% over several years, primarily a result of broader enrollment and increased usage during and after the pandemic.

Recent federal budget measures enacted during the Trump administration have introduced significant recommendations to scale back federal Medicaid contributions and revise the program’s structure. The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” passed into law in 2025, plans to reduce federal Medicaid support by more than $1 trillion over a decade and lays out policies including work requirements and heightened cost-sharing, changes that could limit coverage and funding for certain enrollees. These shifts are expected to transfer additional costs to states and restrict federal Medicaid funding growth as the program continues to reach tens of millions nationwide.

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.