CPT code 00796: Liver transplant anesthesia, recipient transplant procedure2026 Medicare rate & RVUs in California

CMS doesn’t publish an office rate for 00796 in California.

Medicare allowed amount for participating (non-QP) physicians, before deductible, coinsurance and claim adjustments. Not a patient’s bill or a hospital charge.

What 00796 covers

This anesthesia service is for the recipient’s liver transplant operation, a major upper abdominal procedure that may involve removing the diseased liver and implanting a donor liver with vascular and biliary reconstruction. An anesthesiologist or CRNA typically provides and reports the service in a hospital operating room; transplant cases may involve substantial changes in blood loss and circulation during graft implantation and reperfusion.

Use this code for anesthesia during liver transplantation, rather than for anesthesia during a partial liver resection without transplantation or an unspecified upper abdominal operation. The anesthesia record and operative documentation should establish that the patient underwent a liver transplant and support the anesthesia practitioner’s service and time. This code has 30 base units; Medicare payment is (base units + time units) multiplied by the locality’s anesthesia conversion factor. Anesthesia time is reported in minutes, starting when the practitioner begins preparing the patient for anesthesia and ending when personal attendance ends and the patient can safely be placed under postoperative care. Minutes are divided by 15 to calculate time units to one decimal place.

This summary was written with AI assistance from CMS physician fee schedule data and checked against the CMS billing rules shown here. Rates on this page come directly from CMS files.

Where 00796 pays more and less in California

The same RVUs, adjusted for each area’s costs. Open a locality for its calculation, history and nearby areas.

29 of 29 payment localities

How the 00796 rate is calculated

Each of 00796’s three RVUs is multiplied by a geographic index (GPCI) for the payment locality, added up, and multiplied by the conversion factor. Drag the indexes or enter a ZIP to see what moves the rate.

Payment rules and modifiers for 00796

00796 has no global surgery period, no multiple-procedure, bilateral or assistant-at-surgery adjustment, and no professional/technical split. What changes the payment is where the service happens: the place of service on the claim decides whether Medicare pays the office or the facility rate.

00796 compared with similar codes

How to choose

00790Upper abdominal anesthesiaIntraperitoneal procedures

00796 identifies anesthesia for liver transplantation; 00790 is the less specific upper abdominal intraperitoneal category.

00792Liver resection anesthesiaPartial hepatectomy

Choose 00792 for anesthesia during partial hepatectomy without transplantation. Use 00796 for the liver transplant recipient operation.

00794Pancreatectomy anesthesiaUpper abdominal procedure

00794 applies to anesthesia for upper abdominal pancreatectomy; 00796 is for liver transplantation.

Codes related to 00796

Related codes aren’t interchangeable: bill the code that matches the service performed.

Where these rates come from

FeeBase calculates base physician payments from CMS work, practice-expense and malpractice RVUs, adjusted by each locality’s geographic indexes and the conversion factor. Services without a published rate are labeled, never given a made-up amount. Amounts are Medicare allowed amounts before claim adjustments: not a patient’s bill or a commercial rate.

CMS RVU26D · effective Oct 1, 2026 through the day before Jan 1, 2027

Open CMS sourceHow we calculate rates