Findings from Indiana University Update Knowledge of Managed Care (Simulated Power Analyses for Observational Studies: an Application To the Affordable Care Act Medicaid Expansion): Managed Care

2022 OCT 12 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Health Policy and Law Daily -- Investigators publish new report on Managed Care. According to news reporting from Bloomington, Indiana, by NewsRx journalists, research stated, “Power is an important factor in assessing the likely validity of a statistical estimate. An analysis with low power is unlikely to produce convincing evidence of a treatment effect even when one exists.”

The news correspondents obtained a quote from the research from Indiana University, “Of greater concern, a statistically significant estimate from a low-powered analysis is likely to misstate the true effect size, including finding estimates of the wrong sign or that are several times too large. Yet statistical power is rarely reported in published economics work. This is in part because many modern research designs are complex enough that power cannot be easily ascertained using simple formulae. Power can also be difficult to estimate in observational settings. Using an applied example-the link between gaining health insurance and mortality-we conduct a simulated power analysis to outline the importance of power and ways to estimate power in complex research settings. We find that standard difference -in-differences and triple differences analyses of Medicaid expansions using county or state mortality data would need to induce reductions in population mortality of at least 2% to be well powered.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “While there is no single, correct method for conducting a simulated power analysis, our manuscript outlines how applied researchers can conduct simulations appropriate to their settings.(.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: Simulated Power Analyses for Observational Studies: an Application To the Affordable Care Act Medicaid Expansion. Journal of Public Economics, 2022;213:104713. Journal of Public Economics can be contacted at: Elsevier Science Sa, PO Box 564, 1001 Lausanne, Switzerland. (Elsevier - www.elsevier.com; Journal of Public Economics - http://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-public-economics/)

Our news journalists report that additional information may be obtained by contacting Alex Hollingsworth, Indiana University, ONeill Sch Publ & Environm Affairs, Bloomington, IN 47405, United States. Additional authors for this research include Bernard Black, Kosali Simon and Leticia Nunes.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpubeco.2022.104713. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

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