North Little Rock Medicaid payments for medicine services hit $4,108,902 in 2024

Providers in North Little Rock billed Medicaid $4,108,902 in 2024 for services included in the Medicine Services and Procedures category, data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database show. This amount represents an increase of 2.5% compared with 2023, during which $4,009,286 in claims were recorded for the same services.

Medicaid, a public health insurance program managed by the states with joint federal and state funding, covers low-income families, children, seniors, and individuals with disabilities. It is one of the largest components of the U.S. health care landscape.

Since Medicaid payments use taxpayer dollars, shifts in billing levels shed light on how public health care resources are distributed within a community.

The “Medicine Services and Procedures” group covers services defined by specific care provided, using established HCPCS and CPT code ranges. This analysis assigned a single service category to each billing code based on these prefixes and numeric ranges, grouping similar services, preventing duplication, and maintaining consistent comparisons over time.

Medicine Services and Procedures ranked as the second largest Medicaid payment category in North Little Rock in 2024, with notable increases seen in other service groups as well.

Throughout Arkansas, Medicine Services and Procedures also ranked second by Medicaid payments for 2024.

Between 2019 and 2024, North Little Rock saw its Medicaid payments for Medicine Services and Procedures rise by $2,107,385, or 105.3%, with particularly high year-over-year increases occurring in 2022 and 2023.

This category’s Medicaid funding was spread across North Little Rock but was concentrated in a handful of ZIP codes. In 2024, ZIP codes 72118, 72116, and 72117 recorded the largest amounts—$1,920,509, $1,381,683, and $548,830, respectively. These top 3 ZIP codes together comprised 93.7% of the city’s Medicaid payments in this category for the year.

Individual billing codes also dominated Medicaid payments within the Medicine Services and Procedures section.

For additional context, payments for Medicine Services and Procedures in North Little Rock rose 2.5% between 2023 and 2024, while all Medicaid claim categories citywide saw a 5.6% change during that span.

According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, combined federal and state outlays for Medicaid reached roughly $871.7 billion in fiscal year 2023—approximately 18% of national health spending—which is up from $613.5 billion in 2019, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This jump equates to about 40% growth in only a few years, largely because of expanded enrollment and increased use during and after the pandemic.

Recent national budget actions under the Trump administration have introduced numerous efforts to limit federal Medicaid funds and change the program’s structure. The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” enacted in 2025, is anticipated to reduce federal Medicaid funding by over $1 trillion over 10 years. The act includes changes such as new work requirements and higher cost sharing that might reduce some recipients’ Medicaid coverage and shift additional expenses to state budgets even as millions continue to utilize the program.

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.