The Workers’ Compensation Research Institute published their 2026 Medical Price Index, which compares prices paid for medical professional services across 36 states from 2008 to 2025, focusing on services commonly billed by physicians, physical therapists, and chiropractors, such as evaluation and management, physical medicine, surgery, radiology, neurological testing, pain management injections, and emergency care.

This report serves as a relative benchmark for medical inflation in workers’ comp, offering a state-level price index to help policymakers and stakeholders compare prices and track trends tied to changes in fee schedules.

According to the report, prices paid for a similar set of professional services varied significantly across study states in 2025, ranging from 28% below the 36-state median in Massachusetts to 174% above the 36-state median in Wisconsin. Growth in prices varied widely across states between 2008-2025, from 1% in Connecticut to 83% in Wisconsin.

States with no fee schedules had higher prices and faster price grown; prices in non-fee schedule states were 41-188% higher than the median price of the fee schedule states. From 2008-2025, the typical growth among non-fee schedule states was 43%, faster than the typical 19% growth among fee schedule states.

Prices paid for workers’ comp medical professional services grew faster in most states from 2021-2024, due to higher inflation in the general economy, especially for states that update their fee schedules based on all price indices, rather than on medical price indices.

In 2025, price growth slowed in many states, although the overall prices paid for professional services in Florida increased 41% in 2025, following workers’ comp fee schedule increases that began that year. Almost all types of services in the state had large price growth, ranging from 26% for pain management injections to 67% for office visits.