MCBS Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
- What is MCBS?
- What is the difference between the Access to Care and Cost and Use modules?
- What is the most recent release available?
- Who is the MCBS sample?
- What claims files are available with the MCBS data?
- Is there an extra cost for obtaining the associated matched claims files?
- What is a stratified cluster sample?
The Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey (MCBS) was designed to provide a more complete picture of the use of health services, expenditures, and sources of payment for the Medicare population. The MCBS combines information obtained from CMS administrative and claims data files with the in-person survey instruments.
The Access to Care module is designed to represent the "always enrolled" Medicare population. The Cost and Use module is designed to represent the "ever enrolled" Medicare population. Click here to examine a table comparing these two population sizes for 1999. The Cost and Use module contains more detailed information on health care utilization and costs during the calendar year for the panelists, while Access to Care contains additional survey supplements.
The 2007 Access to Care and the 2006 Cost and Use are the most recent module releases.
Respondents for the MCBS were samples from the Medicare enrollment file to be representative of the Medicare population as a whole and by age group: Under 45, 45 to 64, 65 to 69, 70 to 74, 75 to 79, 80 to 84, and 85 and Older. Because of interest in their special health care needs, the oldest old (85 and over) and the disable (64 and under) were oversampled to permit detailed analysis of these subpopulations.
Inpatient, SNF, Outpatient, Part B/Physician, DME, Hospice, and HHA
No, the claims are available with the corresponding module at no additional cost. In the research protocol and request letter, a researcher must provide justification for why these files are needed for the proposed study.
The sample of the Medicare population that is surveyed is stratified by age and drawn within zip code clusters designated as primary sampling units (PSUs). For this reason, survey findings need to use statistical software, such as Stata, Sudaan, Westvar, or SAS, that allow for variance weighting in the statistical procedures to adjust for the non-random sampling procedures.
Last Modified October 15, 2009