OBJECTIVES: The CMS Innovation Center (CMMI) has a growing number of models that test payment and service delivery to achieve better care for patients at lower cost. Among these are episode-based payment models (i.e. bundled models) where participants are accountable for the cost and quality of care provided to Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries during the inpatient stay and 90-days after discharge. The objective of this analysis was to determine average Medicare expenditures from index hospitalization through 90 days for surgical aortic valve replacements (SAVR) compared to existing mandatory orthopedic and cardiovascular episode of care models from CMMI. METHODS:  Utilizing the 100% SAF Medicare file we identified index hospitalizations anchored by MS-DRGs that align with the episodes of interest. Medicare expenditures for the index hospitalization, readmissions, post-acute care, outpatient care, and physician services occurring within 90 days of discharge were analyzed. Descriptive statistics were used to compare and contrast the spending across each episodes of care RESULTS:  90-day episode of care average spending for SAVR [$62,912] was higher than current CMMI orthopedic and cardiovascular [CABG $46,510, AMI PCI $25,976, AMI Medical $27,536] episodes of care. Considerable variation across procedures existed with the most striking difference occurring in the index hospitalization. For SAVR procedures, 78% of spending is concentrated in the index hospitalization versus current CMMI cardiovascular and orthopedic models [range from 45% to 75%] where the distribution of spending is more evenly dispersed across other settings-of-care. For SAVR, post-acute care represented 6% while readmissions accounted for 7% of the 90-day expenditures. CONCLUSIONS:  The high percentage of spending on SAVR in the inpatient setting (78%) may create a challenge for a bundled payment model. Conditions with high post-acute care and readmission rates could be better targets for testing bundled payments and offer providers more opportunities to improve care and lower Medicare spending.