POS code 53: Community Mental Health Center.

The CMS definition

A facility that provides the following services: outpatient services, including specialized outpatient services for children, the elderly, individuals who are chronically ill, and residents of the CMHC's mental health services area who have been discharged from inpatient treatment at a mental health facility; 24 hour a day emergency care services; day treatment, other partial hospitalization services, or psychosocial rehabilitation services; screening for patients being considered for admission to State mental health facilities to determine the appropriateness of such admission; and consultation and education services.

That is the description CMS publishes for POS 53, Community Mental Health Center, in the Place of Service Code Set and in chapter 26 of the Medicare Claims Processing Manual. In the manual’s table it carries the Facility rate (F) designation for payment under the Physician Fee Schedule.

What it means in plain terms

POS 53 is for a CMHC that meets the long CMS definition: outpatient services including specialized services for children, the elderly, the chronically ill and discharged residents; 24-hour emergency care; day treatment or partial hospitalization or psychosocial rehabilitation; screening for state mental health facility admission; and consultation and education.

When it is used

• A service is furnished at a facility that provides the CMHC service list in the CMS definition.
• Do not use it for any outpatient mental health office just because it treats mental health. A practitioner's own office is POS 11, and a facility whose planned program is partial hospitalization is described by POS 52.

Billing implications (Medicare)

The manual marks POS 53 F, so Medicare physician fee schedule services are paid at the facility rate.

That is easy to miss because POS 54, 55 and 57 are all NF. A claim built on the assumption that a mental health setting is non-facility can land in the wrong rate class.

The general rule in section 10.6 of the manual is that the POS code “generally” reflects the actual setting where the beneficiary receives the face-to-face service, with two exceptions: a registered hospital inpatient or outpatient is reported with the hospital code regardless of where the encounter happens. The code goes in item 24B of the paper Form CMS-1500 or the matching field of the 837P.

Look-alike codes

• POS 52: Psychiatric facility-partial hospitalization. Facility rate.
• POS 55: Residential substance abuse treatment facility. Non-facility rate.
• POS 57: Non-residential substance abuse treatment facility. Non-facility rate.
• POS 56: Psychiatric residential treatment center. Facility rate.

For every code in one list, with the 02 vs 10 vs 11 telehealth verdict, see the place of service code lookup.

Sources

• CMS: Place of Service Code Set — official code list and descriptions, page database updated May 2, 2024 (retrieved 2026-11-02)
• CMS: Medicare Claims Processing Manual, Chapter 26 (Rev. 12779, issued 08-09-24) — sections 10.5 and 10.6, facility and non-facility designations and special considerations (retrieved 2026-11-02)

Every definition and rule above was read from these CMS pages on November 2, 2026. Payers revise code lists, contracts and policies, so confirm anything that affects a claim with the payer. CMS itself tells billers to check each payer (Medicare, Medicaid, private plans) for how it reimburses each code.