Data on Managed Care Reported by Brittni Frederiksen and Colleagues (The Limitations of Using Medicaid Administrative Data in Abortion Research): Managed Care

2024 OCT 02 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- New research on Managed Care is the subject of a report. According to news reporting originating in San Francisco, California, by NewsRx journalists, research stated, “To identify limitations of abortion data in national Medicaid claims files by comparing abortion counts in Medicaid claims data with state abortion estimates. We used procedure (CPT, HCPCS) and drug (NDC) codes to identify abortion claims in 2009 and 2010 Medicaid Analytic eXtract (MAX) and 2020 Transformed Medicaid Statistical Information System Analytic File (TAF) data.”

The news reporters obtained a quote from the research, “We compared the number of abortions in MAX and TAF to the number of expected abortions covered by Medicaid overall and by state. Based on recent published research, we estimated expected Medicaid-covered abortions as 62% of total abortions in states that use state funds to cover abortion services for Medicaid enrollees and 0.9% in states that follow Hyde restrictions. MAX data identified 11% (38,668/345,480) of expected Medicaid-covered abortions in 2009 and 13% (44,528/330,801) of expected Medicaid-covered abortions in 2010. In 2020 TAF data, we found 25% (69,728/279,048) of the expected Medicaid-covered abortions. Among the 16 states that used state funds to cover abortions for Medicaid enrollees in 2020, the majority had <10% of expected Medicaid-covered abortions (n=8). Three states had between 10-50% of expected abortions. Four states had between 51-75% of expected abortions. One state did not have sufficient data to report. Abortion claims in MAX/TAF are an undercount of abortions covered by Medicaid and this undercount varies across states. Variation in reporting across states and across time likely introduces bias into any research trying to use MAX/TAF abortion claims across states and time. Researchers should use extreme caution when using MAX/TAF for abortion-related research.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “Researchers should use caution when using the Medicaid Analytic eXtract (MAX) and Transformed Medicaid Statistical Information System Analytic Files (TAF) for abortion-related research questions.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: The Limitations of Using Medicaid Administrative Data in Abortion Research. Contraception, 2024:110704. Contraception can be contacted at: Elsevier Science Inc, Ste 800, 230 Park Ave, New York, NY 10169, USA. (Elsevier - www.elsevier.com; Contraception - http://www.journals.elsevier.com/contraception/)

Our news correspondents report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Brittni Frederiksen, KFF, 185 Berry St #2000, San Francisco, CA 94107, United States. Additional authors for this research include Emily Dennis, Guodong Liu, Doug Leslie, Alina Salganicoff and Sarah Roberts.

The publisher of the journal Contraception can be contacted at: Elsevier Science Inc, Ste 800, 230 Park Ave, New York, NY 10169, USA.

(Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world.)