Lakewood Medicaid payments for alcohol and drug abuse treatment climb to $10.6 million in 2024

Lakewood Medicaid providers billed a total of $10,629,164 for services within the Alcohol and Drug Abuse Treatment category in 2024, according to data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database. This amount reflects a 13% increase over 2023, when $9,406,779 in claims were reported for the same services.

Medicaid, the public health insurance program administered by states and funded by both federal and state governments, covers low-income families and individuals, seniors, children, and people with disabilities. It remains a key element of the U.S. health care system.

Shifts in Medicaid payment levels can highlight how taxpayer-funded health care dollars are distributed within a community.

The “Alcohol and Drug Abuse Treatment” category groups Medicaid-billed services based on the type of care given, categorized using standardized HCPCS and CPT code ranges. Each billing code in this analysis was linked to one service category using established code ranges, ensuring related services could be tracked together, preventing duplicate counts, and maintaining accurate rankings across years.

Alcohol and Drug Abuse Treatment had the highest Medicaid payment total among all service categories in Lakewood for 2024, though spending grew across multiple categories.

Statewide in Washington, Alcohol and Drug Abuse Treatment ranked fourth in Medicaid payment totals for 2024.

Comparing the five years prior to 2024, Lakewood’s Medicaid payments for Alcohol and Drug Abuse Treatment rose by $2,024,184, or 16%. Periods of especially strong growth included 2020 and 2023, when increases were particularly significant.

Spending for care in this category spanned the city but was mainly concentrated in a few ZIP codes. In 2024, payment data show ZIP code 98499 accounted for $10,629,163 of the total. Altogether, the leading 1 ZIP code represented 100% of Lakewood’s Medicaid payments in this treatment category for the year.

Within Alcohol and Drug Abuse Treatment, Medicaid reimbursements were focused among a relatively small set of billing codes.

Lakewood’s Medicaid spending in this category increased by 13% from 2023 to 2024, compared to a 10.8% overall rise across all Medicaid claim types locally during the same period.

According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, federal and state Medicaid expenditures reached approximately $871.7 billion in fiscal year 2023, representing around 18% of total national health spending, sharply up from $613.5 billion in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic.

This growth, amounting to about 40% in just a few years, was largely the result of rising enrollment and greater service usage during and following the pandemic.

Federal budget laws enacted under the Trump administration have introduced significant changes to Medicaid structure and funding. For instance, the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” passed in 2025, is expected to reduce federal Medicaid spending by more than $1 trillion over the coming decade and makes policy changes such as work requirements and increased cost-sharing. These moves could lower funding and coverage for some enrollees, shift more responsibility to states, and restrict federal support even as tens of millions remain covered by Medicaid.

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.