How much does an echocardiogram cost?

Cost breakdown

Each table below comes from one source, named underneath it, with the date that source last revised the figures. Everything is a United States figure in USD.

What changes the price

Whether the Doppler is inside the code or added to it

The structural one. At Franklin Memorial Hospital the complete study with Doppler built in is $2,480.40 as CPT 93306, while the version without it is $939.60 as 93307 with the Doppler at $934.10 and the colour flow at $777.00 charged separately on top.

Which hospital, and the order changes by code

A complete echocardiogram with Doppler is $2,480.40 at Franklin Memorial Hospital, $2,910.00 at Boston Medical Center and $5,935.00 at The University of Chicago Medical Center. On the transoesophageal study the cheapest of the three is Boston Medical Center at $3,447.00 and the dearest of the two non-academic hospitals is Franklin Memorial at $3,794.65.

Which of several prices the hospital means by one code

The University of Chicago Medical Center publishes CPT 93325 at $24.00, $1,515.00 and $1,539.00, all as facility charges in one file on one day, and nothing in the file says which one applies.

Whether the hospital files a cash price at all

Boston Medical Center files 45 percent of its gross charge as the discounted cash price on every echocardiogram row, so a complete study with Doppler is $1,309.50 rather than $2,910.00. Franklin Memorial Hospital and The University of Chicago Medical Center file the same figure in both columns.

Which kind of echocardiogram was ordered

At Boston Medical Center a limited follow-up study is $1,285.00, a complete one with Doppler $2,910.00, a stress echo $2,376.00 and a transoesophageal study $3,447.00, all on the same list on the same day.

Whether the cardiologist is in the number

These are facility charges or, at Boston Medical Center, unlabelled ones. Somebody reads the study and that reading is usually its own charge, so a quote for the scan may be one line of two.

How to pay less

Ask whether it is one code or three

It is the question this page exists to prompt. At Franklin Memorial Hospital the bundled study is $2,480.40 while the unbundled one starts at $939.60 and gains a $934.10 Doppler charge and a $777.00 colour flow charge.

Ask for the cash price by name

Boston Medical Center files $1,309.50 for a complete echocardiogram with Doppler against a gross charge of $2,910.00. The other two hospitals here file no discount at all, so it is worth asking rather than assuming.

Ask whether a limited study answers the question

A follow-up or limited echocardiogram is CPT 93308 and is the cheapest transthoracic option at all three: $865.55 at Franklin Memorial Hospital, $1,285.00 at Boston Medical Center and $1,625.00 at The University of Chicago Medical Center. Whether it is enough is a clinical decision rather than a saving, so it is a question for the doctor.

Ask which of the published prices applies

Where a hospital publishes more than one against a code, as The University of Chicago Medical Center does on the colour flow add-on, the file does not say which. Ask before the appointment rather than after the bill.

Compare the same code between hospitals

An echocardiogram is at least seven different codes, so comparing the word between two providers compares nothing. CPT 93306 is $2,480.40 at Franklin Memorial Hospital, $2,910.00 at Boston Medical Center and $5,935.00 at The University of Chicago Medical Center.

Ask who else will send a bill

Every figure here is a facility or unlabelled charge and none includes the cardiologist who reads the study.

What to read next

An echocardiogram is an ultrasound of the heart, and the same machine pointed at anything else is a different code again: what an ultrasound costs elsewhere in the body is on the same files.

The same heart can be imaged under stress, which is a different code at a different price: what a stress echo and a nuclear stress test cost.

Questions

Where these figures come from

Every figure here is published by the hospital named beside it, in US dollars, in the United States, in its own machine-readable standard charges file under 45 CFR 180.50, and each file carries the attestation that the information encoded is true, accurate and complete as of the date in the file. The dates are the ones the files give themselves: 13 March 2026 for Boston Medical Center, attested by Christopher Abate, 9 September 2025 for Franklin Memorial Hospital, attested by Kenneth Olsen, and 1 April 2026 for The University of Chicago Medical Center, attested by Chris Allen. The Boston Medical Center and Franklin Memorial files were downloaded on 25 September 2026 and the University of Chicago file on 23 September 2026. BEFORE ANY CODE WAS QUOTED THE DISTINCT PUBLISHED PRICES FOR IT WERE COUNTED PER CODE AND PER BILLING CLASS: every code at all three hospitals carries exactly one price except the University of Chicago colour flow add-on, which carries three and is shown with all three. Boston Medical Center publishes no billing_class column, so its rows are called unlabelled rather than assumed to be facility charges; the other two label every echocardiogram row facility. None of these figures includes the cardiologist who reads the study. The first table sets three hospitals side by side because they are the same codes, and the three columns remain three separate filings rather than one measurement. Nothing here is averaged, turned into a ratio or restated as a typical cost, and no figure on this page is added to another.

• Hospital Price Transparency

  Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services · page last modified 16 September 2026

  The rule itself. CMS states that starting 1 January 2021 each hospital operating in the United States is required to publish pricing information online in two ways, as a comprehensive machine-readable file with all items and services and as a display of shoppable services in a consumer-friendly format, that CMS audits a sample of hospitals and investigates complaints, and that hospitals may face civil monetary penalties for noncompliance. Cited for the obligation and the enforcement, never for a price.

• Hospital Price Transparency: Consumers

  Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services · page last modified 10 September 2024

  CMS's own description of what a hospital must make public: standard charges including the rates they negotiate with insurance companies and the discounted price a hospital is willing to accept directly from a patient if paid in cash. Cited for what the files are supposed to contain, which is how this page can say what a given file leaves out.

• Hospital Price Transparency: Hospitals

  Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services · page last modified 10 March 2026

  The CMS page setting out what a hospital must publish: a single machine-readable file of gross charges, discounted cash prices, payer-specific negotiated charges and de-identified minimum and maximum negotiated charges for all items and services, and a display of at least 300 shoppable services a consumer can schedule in advance.

• Price transparency: standard charges machine-readable file

  The University of Chicago Medical Center · Attested by Chris Allen · file last_updated_on 1 April 2026

  The hospital's own machine-readable file, 363488183_the-university-of-chicago-medical-center_standardcharges.json, schema version 3.0.0, carrying the attestation required by 45 CFR 180.50 that the information encoded is true, accurate and complete as of the date in the file. At MS-DRG level it publishes no gross charge and no discounted cash price, and instead names each health plan and the rate agreed with it, alongside a minimum and a maximum.

• Pricing and estimates: standard charges machine-readable file

  Boston Medical Center · Attested by Christopher Abate · file last_updated_on 13 March 2026

  The hospital's own machine-readable file, 043314093_BostonMedicalCenter_standardcharges.csv, schema version 3.0.0, carrying the attestation required by 45 CFR 180.50 that the information encoded is true, accurate and complete as of the date in the file. Unlike its inpatient rows, its imaging rows carry a gross charge, a discounted cash price and a rate for each named health plan, which is why this page can answer the question about paying without insurance from a published figure rather than an estimate.

• Standard charges machine-readable file

  Franklin Memorial Hospital · Attested by Kenneth Olsen · file last_updated_on 9 September 2025

  The hospital's own machine-readable file, 010238552-1922791417_mainehealth_standardcharges.csv, schema version 3.0.0, published by MaineHealth for its Franklin Memorial Hospital location in Farmington, Maine, and carrying the same attestation under 45 CFR 180.50. It is the oldest of the three files quoted here and is said rather than smoothed. On every imaging row its discounted cash price is identical to its gross charge.

Sources on this page checked between 23 September and 9 October 2026. How we source prices.