Reflections: Imersis & T-MSIS Data Quality – MESC 2021

Elkridge, MD – A cornerstone annual Medicaid-focused information technology education and networking event since the 1990s, the Medicaid Enterprise Systems Conference (MESC) brought together 1,600 state Medicaid technology leaders and private sector companies to discuss procurement, Medicaid Management Information System (MMIS) modularity, health information exchange (HIE), and data analytics. 

This year, Medicaid data quality was a common theme throughout MESC. The Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services (CMCS) leadership echoed this theme by consistently pointing to CMS’s desire to promote innovation among the vendor community to help states solve operational and data challenges.

NewWave and Mathematica offered a new narrative about transforming state data quality and provided an innovative solution to address the long-standing challenge of improving Medicaid data quality: Imersis. 

NewWave, a leading provider of Information Technology (IT), government, and industry business solutions, alongside Mathematica, a national Transformed Medicaid Statistical Information System (T-MSIS) expert, and an insight partner to public and private-sector changemakers, launched Imersis earlier this year, a unique cloud-based data quality tool focused on T-MSIS business applications and advanced analytics of data quality results. Imersis grants the states insight into their T-MSIS data quality and allows them to dive deep, explore, and refine T-MSIS data. Ongoing efforts CMS efforts to incentivize improved state data quality, broaden the scope of data captured through both T-MSIS and other routine submissions, and enhance the use of T-MSIS-first calculations to engage in federal oversight of state Medicaid programs, the launch of Imersis is both timely and relevant to MMIS modernization programs. 

Does your state’s MMIS program have insight into its data quality challenges?

Imersis helps state Medicaid agencies prepare T-MSIS data for advanced analytics and to meet federal data quality standards. By mirroring CMS’ data quality evaluation approach at the individual measure level, Imersis not only scores T-MSIS data quality similar to CMS, but the system is rapidly adaptable to changes in the approach to federal data quality oversight. Imersis allows state Medicaid agencies to receive ongoing T-MSIS data quality evaluations in near real-time. Imersis also provides drill-down analytics to observe data quality behavior over time and at the functional level. This flexible approach allows states to identify root causes of poor data quality and monitor the effectiveness of remediation efforts.

What is the long-term investment in data quality?

During the CMS plenary, leadership identified a long-term commitment to MMIS modernization, noting over $60 billion in funding over the next five (5) years for MMIS systems and module implementation. Paired with this commitment is an expectation of modern, sustainable, and adaptable MMIS construction that produces high-quality and continuous operations through implementation and modernization efforts. The commitment is reflected in CMS’s outcomes-based approach to certification, where states and federal funders engage in a cooperative goals-based implementation and evaluation of MMIS capabilities. With such substantial financial investments in MMIS modernization and the downstream effects poor data quality has on program evaluation, integrity, and the implementation of value-based payment programs, states should seek independent assessment and validation of the effect modernization efforts have on data quality.

How does Imersis add value to your data quality investments?

The response from states that saw first-hand how Imersis provides insight into data quality has been overwhelming. From rapid identification of sample record sets representative of data quality problems to longitudinal comparison of data evaluation outcomes, Imersis can help states address data quality issues independently of monthly T-MSIS submissions. In addition, by incorporating T-MSIS evaluation into the systems development lifecycle, continuous and independent evaluation of systems releases and patches is possible within a state’s Medicaid Enterprise System.

To conclude, CMS has established data quality as a durable priority and will continue to develop TMSIS as the system of record for state Medicaid data submissions and analysis as federal payers and oversight agencies increase their use of T-MSIS to evaluate state programs; Imersis helps states understand and control their data to make improvements.