MAXEM

What’s New in July 2012!

• A new Issue Brief is now available, titled “Migration Patterns for Medicaid Enrollees, 2005-2007.”  This issue brief presents an analysis of the migration patterns of Medicaid enrollees by eligibility group and state over the period January 2005 through December 2007.  The analysis focuses on two major topic areas.  The first one is a national analysis of migration that examines the number of enrollees by the number of moves, the number of states to which enrollees moved and the number of moves associated with enrollment gaps of varying lengths.  The second one is a state analysis presented in two parts.  The first part includes in-migration, out-migration, net migration, along with a comparison to overall U.S. population migration.  The second part examines the number of enrollees who moved, the number of moves, and enrollment gaps for moves between pairs of states.  It and the full report on which it is based are available in the “Downloads” section below.  

• A new Issue Brief is now available, titled “Medicaid Enrollment Gaps, 2005-2007.”  The Medicaid program provides health insurance coverage every year to more than 60 million Americans spanning all ages.  Eligibility is based on both categorical factors and income. Each can change, resulting in a potential loss of eligibility for an enrollee.  Prior research has established that the loss of Medicaid coverage, whether temporary or permanent, has consequences for both the individual and the community.  In this issue brief, which is based on a larger report, we use data from a source—Medicaid administrative records that have been unduplicated and linked over time—to investigate discontinuities in Medicaid enrollment by eligibility group over the period January 2005 through December 2007.  We focus on two areas:  (1) continuity of coverage and (2) the duration of enrollment gaps.  The Issue Brief and the full report on which it is based are available in the “Downloads” section below. 

What’s New in April 2012!

• A new Issue Brief is now available, titled “Movement of Children between Medicaid and CHIP, 2005 to 2007”.  The Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) provides health insurance coverage to millions of children whose families are unable to obtain employer-sponsored insurance or purchase private non-group coverage but whose Incomes are above the limits that would qualify their children for Medicaid.  Family incomes are fluid, however, and many children who receive coverage through CHIP were covered by Medicaid earlier or will shift their coverage to Medicaid later.  This issue brief uses data from a source—Medicaid administrative records that have been unduplicated and linked over time—to examine the movement of children between Medicaid and CHIP from 2005 through 2007.  These findings provide perspective on potential transitions in coverage among low-income adults once the Affordable Care Act is fully implemented.  The Issue Brief and the full report on which it is based are available in the “Downloads” section below.

Description
Development of the Medicaid Analytic Extract Enrollee Master (MAXEM) Data, 2005 to 2007

Recent policy developments have highlighted the importance of developing a more effective means of linking Medicaid records over time and across states. To address this and related needs, CMS contracted with Mathematica to design and implement a new MAXEM data set that removes duplicate enrollee records both within and across years and within and across states.  Two reports have been completed and released.  The first report describes the design and development of the MAXEM data for 2005 and 2006.  The second report describes the design and development of the MAXEM data for 2005-2007.  While these data sets will not be released to the research community, there is a wealth of information contained in these reports about enrollment over time and enrollees with more than one record within a state and across states.