Open Source Code for the T-MSIS Analytic Files (TAF)
This report focuses on recent work by AcademyHealth’s Medicaid Data Learning Network (MDLN), particularly by analysts at Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU), to develop a GitHub repository of open-source code for Transformed Medicaid Statistical Information System (T-MSIS) Analytic Files (TAF) data. The MDLN hopes that this repository provides researchers with consistent and standardized procedures and definitions, and also allows them to utilize easy-to-use functions to perform frequently needed data preparation and manipulation functions rather than writing time-consuming functions themselves.
With the goal of assisting researchers working with the T-MSIS Analytic Files (TAF) data, the Medicaid Data Learning Network's (MDLN) open source repository contains a number of functions that perform common research tasks using the TAF data, such as providing lists of beneficiaries with certain conditions, evaluating data quality, and constructing measures. This report provides a guide for researchers to get full value out of the repository, including notifying them that they must install R and the ‘devltools’ package for R, as well as providing instructions on how to do so.
The OHSU analysts who developed this repository focused on including functions that would likely be of immediate use to TAF researchers, such as those that replicate DQ Atlas’ analysis of data quality in the Annual Provider (APR) files and return all ICD10 codes for opioid use disorder as a dictionary. A number of other measures are included in the repository, and analysts are currently working on bringing additional functions into the repository to better serve the MDLN research community.