Santa Ana Medicaid dental spending rose to $10.3 million in 2024, up 5.8%

In 2024, Medicaid providers in Santa Ana billed a total of $10,336,296 for care categorized as Dental Services, data from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Medicaid Provider Spending database shows. This amount represented a 5.8% rise from the prior year, when claims for Dental Services totaled $9,768,719.

Medicaid serves as a public health insurance initiative operated by states and financed through federal and state government funding. The program insures low-income individuals and families, as well as seniors, children, and people with disabilities, making it a major component of the U.S. health care system.

Because Medicaid is publicly funded, fluctuations in local spending provide insight into the allocation of public health resources in a given area.

The “Dental Services” category encompasses a set of Medicaid-billed treatments grouped by service type, according to standardized HCPCS and CPT codes. For this report, each code was assigned to a single service category, based on shared code prefixes and ranges, so related services could be reviewed together while ensuring accurate category rankings and avoiding duplicate counts.

Although multiple Medicaid service categories experienced growing expenditures, Dental Services was the sixth largest by total Medicaid payments in Santa Ana for 2024.

Statewide, Dental Services ranked 11th among Medicaid spending categories in California during 2024.

From 2020 through 2024, Medicaid payments for Dental Services in Santa Ana rose by $5,814,851, or 128.6%. Periods such as 2021 and 2022 saw especially sharp increases in year-over-year spending.

While Dental Services payments were distributed across the city, a small group of ZIP codes accounted for the majority. In 2024, ZIP code 92704 saw $3,338,348 in Medicaid Dental Services payments, 92701 saw $2,755,145, and 92703 received $1,673,361. These top 3 ZIP codes represented 75.1% of the city’s Medicaid Dental Services expenditures in 2024.

Within the Dental Services segment, a handful of billing codes accounted for most Medicaid payments.

To compare, Dental Services Medicaid payments in Santa Ana rose 5.8% between 2024 and 2023, whereas the combined increase for all Medicaid claim categories citywide during that time was 11.9%.

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

The $258 billion increase represented nearly 40% growth in just several years, largely due to higher enrollment and increased demand during and after the pandemic.

Recent federal budget actions during the Trump administration included notable plans to reduce federal Medicaid funding and alter the program’s structure. The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” enacted in 2025, is projected to cut federal Medicaid spending by more than $1 trillion over 10 years, adding measures like work requirements and larger cost-sharing, which could limit access and shrink funding for some beneficiaries. These policies are expected to raise states’ costs and slow the growth of federal Medicaid funds, despite tens of millions of Americans still covered by 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.