Using encounter data from Medicaid HMOs for research and monitoring.

Complete encounter data from Medicaid HMOs are necessary to monitor patient access to care, compute risk-adjusted payments, and estimate savings from managed care. Encounter data from TennCare for 1996 and 1997 appear to be incomplete. This is the case despite state review of data quality, financial sanctions for Medicaid HMOs that appeared to be submitting incomplete data, and a preliminary assessment of encounter data for samples of two Medicaid enrollee subgroups suggesting that the encounter data might be reasonably complete. Although all states are required to submit Medicaid encounter data to the government, most states currently produce incomplete encounter data.