Health care utilization data from the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) are a key data source for population health research. UC researchers collectively spend millions of dollars each year accessing these data, yet once purchased, they can be re-used for a fraction of the cost.
CPL seeks to make these data accessible to a wider range of UC students and researchers.
The Health Data Access Initiative (HDAI) will establish a UC-wide repository for Medicare and Medicaid data from CMS. When researchers purchase data, those data will then be available for other UC researchers to re-use.
HDAI will support a range of projects across the social and health sciences.
What are the costs?
For non-reuse requests, CMS’s fee list provides pricing. For reuse requests, CMS charges a $2,000 fee for data reuse.
CPL charges an additional $6,713 fee that covers our costs for hosting, curating, and provisioning the data. This fee is subject to change, and usually changes each July.
What data are available?
HDAI’s current projects and datasets are listed in the table below. These datasets are national in scope, and not just for California. The full listing of data available from CMS is here.
What is the process for requesting access to the data?
If you’re interested in using the CMS data, reach out to hdai@capolicylab.org with a paragraph describing your research project, and any information about the data that would be required.