No. CPT 96374 lives in the Medicine section (the 96360-96379 hydration and drug administration subsection), not in the 70000-series Radiology section. The confusion comes from where it is often attempted: the IV push of contrast for a CT or MRI, of a radiopharmaceutical for a nuclear scan, or of contrast during an echocardiogram. In every one of those cases NCCI treats the injection as integral to the imaging procedure and not separately reportable, and no modifier changes that. 96374 applies when a therapeutic, prophylactic or diagnostic drug is pushed IV as its own service — iron, steroids, antiemetics, antibiotics — in a setting where drug administration is payable.
96374 — “Therapeutic, prophylactic, or diagnostic injection (specify substance or drug); intravenous push, single or initial substance/drug” — is grouped with hydration (96360-96361), therapeutic infusion (96365-96368) and the other push codes (96375-96376) under the Medicine section’s Hydration, Therapeutic, Prophylactic, and Diagnostic Injections and Infusions heading. It is priced on the Physician Fee Schedule as a drug administration service and is subject to the one-initial-code-per-encounter rule like the rest of that family (see the 96374 / 96375 / 96376 reference). Nothing about it is a radiology code.
“If a radiologic procedure requires that contrast material be administered parenterally (e.g., IVP, CT, MRI), the vascular access (e.g., CPT codes 36000, 36406, 36410) and contrast administration (e.g., CPT codes 96360-96379) are integral to the procedure and are not separately reportable.” — NCCI Ch. IX §D.1
“The injection of a radiopharmaceutical is an integral component of a nuclear medicine procedure. CPT codes for vascular access (e.g., CPT code 36000) and injection of the radiopharmaceutical (e.g., CPT codes 96360-96379) are not separately reportable.” — NCCI Ch. IX §E.1
The same principle is repeated in the Medicine chapter for cardiac imaging: when echocardiography uses IV push contrast, “the injection of contrast (e.g., CPT codes 96365, 96374, 96375, 96376) is not separately reportable” (NCCI Ch. XI §I.23, Cardiovascular Services). These are “integral to the procedure” policies, not PTP edits with a modifier indicator — appending 59 or XU to the push line does not make contrast administration payable, and doing so is the pattern that draws audits.
| The IV push was… | Report 96374? | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Iodinated contrast for a CT or an IVP | No | Integral to the radiologic procedure (Ch. IX §D.1); the contrast itself is reported with its supply code where payable |
| Gadolinium for an MRI | No | Same rule — parenteral contrast administration is inside the imaging code |
| A radiopharmaceutical for a bone scan or PET | No | Integral to the nuclear medicine procedure (Ch. IX §E.1) |
| Contrast for an echocardiogram | No | Ch. XI §I.23 |
| A drug given by the physician performing a procedure, as anesthesia or intra-procedure care | No | Medicare anesthesia and global surgery rules (Ch. XI §B.11-12) |
| Injectafer 750 mg pushed over 8 minutes in the office, no imaging | Yes | A therapeutic drug administered as the service; 96374 is the initial code |
| Solu-Medrol pushed before a Remicade infusion | Not as 96374 | The infusion is the initial service; the premedication push is the add-on 96375 |
| An antiemetic pushed in a hospital outpatient infusion suite before chemo | Not as 96374 | Chemo infusion outranks it: 96375 (or 96411 if the pushed drug is itself chemotherapy) |
Priced lines for the drug-administration case are in the Code this visit tool on the IV push page.
No. 96374 is in the Medicine section of CPT, under Hydration, Therapeutic, Prophylactic, and Diagnostic Injections and Infusions (96360-96379). Radiology codes are the 70000 series. 96374 is a drug administration code for an intravenous push of a therapeutic, prophylactic or diagnostic substance.
No. NCCI Chapter IX §D.1 states that when a radiologic procedure requires parenteral contrast, the vascular access and the contrast administration (96360-96379) are integral to the procedure and not separately reportable. The contrast material itself may be reported with its supply HCPCS code where the payer pays for it separately.
No. The contrast and radiopharmaceutical rules are “integral to the procedure” policies rather than edits with a modifier indicator; a modifier does not create a separately payable service. Modifier 59 on a push line is reserved for a genuinely distinct drug administration that a PTP edit pairs with another service on the claim.
When a drug is administered by IV push as the service — iron, steroids, antiemetics, antibiotics, immunoglobulin products given by push — in a physician office or by a hospital outpatient department, with no infusion or chemotherapy initial code outranking it that day. If a higher-ranked administration is on the claim, the push is reported as 96375 (or 96411 in the chemotherapy family) instead.
Quoted passages are reproduced from the cited federal publications; everything else is our reading of them. The methodology by which we resolve source disagreements is described in the Methodology.