Medicaid’s Data Gets an Internet-Era Makeover - The New York Times

Earlier in the article: "The data set will be stripped of identifying information before it is released to researchers."

"But the new cloud-based technology, using internet-era software, is flexible and interactive. It opens the door to real-time monitoring of emerging disease clusters, billing patterns and program effects. For example, did the percentage of low birth-weight babies decline after a Medicaid program was put in place? If so, how much?

“This kind of data can help move health care policy from a partisan ideological debate to one informed by knowing who the people affected are and what will likely happen to Medicaid recipients,” said Drew Altman, president of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit health policy research organization.

Though young, Ms. Kim has spent years learning hard-earned lessons about health care. At Google, she was a product manager on Google Health, a failed effort to attract millions of people to use its free, online personal health records."

Medicaid’s Data Gets an Internet-Era Makeover - The New York Times