Authors: Debra J Kane William M Sappenfield
Publish Date: 2013/07/06
Volume: 18, Issue: 4, Pages: 970-977
Abstract
The Iowa Department of Public Health annually links Medicaid claims data to the birth certificate Because the latest version of the birth certificate provides more timely and less costly information on delivery payment source we were interested in assessing the validity and reliability of the birth certificate payment source compared to Medicaid paid claims We linked Medicaid paid claims to birth certificates for calendar years 2007–2009 n = 120626 We measured reliability by Kappa statistic and validity by sensitivity specificity predictive value positive and negative We examined reliability and validity overall and by maternal characteristics eg age race ethnicity education The Kappa statistic for the birth certificate payment source indicated substantial agreement 078 95 CL 078–079 Sensitivity and specificity were also high 863 95 CL 860–86 6 and 919 95 CL 917–921 respectively The predictive value positive was 870 The predictive value negative was 914 Kappa and specificity were lower among women of racial and ethnic minorities women younger than age 24 and women with less education The overall Kappa sensitivity and specificity generally suggest the birth certificate payment source is as valid and reliable as the linked data source The birth certificate payment source is less valid and reliable for women of racial and ethnic minorities women younger than age 24 and those with less education Consequently caution should be exercised when using the birth certificate payment source for monitoring service use by the Medicaid population within specific population subgroupsThis project would not have been possible without the support and collaboration of the IDPH—Bureaus of Family Health Health Statistics and Information Management staff members and the Iowa Department of Human Services—Iowa Medicaid Enterprise staff members The authors thank Drs Cheryl Prince and Connie Bish and Sarah Mauch for their thoughtful comments on this paper
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