Dive Brief:
- On Friday, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released comprehensive public data on services provided by home health agencies to Medicare beneficiaries.
- The Home Health Agency Utilization and Payment Public Use File (Home Health Agency PUF) includes information regarding utilization, payments, and submitted charges. The data are organized by provider, state, and home health resource group.
- The information is provided in an effort to improve transparency, care, and spending. “CMS has been a pioneer in greater data transparency and views it as key to a more effectively functioning healthcare system where information flows more freely," stated CMS Acting Administrator Andrew Slavitt.
Dive Insight:
The data in the Home Health Agency PUF comes from CMS claims data for Medicare beneficiaries in the fee-for-service program available from the CMS Chronic Condition Data Warehouse and covers more than 6 million claims and $18 billion in Medicare payments for 2013.
It includes information on 11,062 home health agencies with their 6-digit identification number, but does not include individually identifiable information on Medicare beneficiaries, the CMS notes.