Comparison of data quality for reports and ratings of ambulatory care by African American and White Medicare managed care enrollees.
OBJECTIVE
Compare missing data and reliability of health care evaluations between African Americans and Whites in Medicare managed care health plans.


METHODS
Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) 3.0 health plan survey data collected from 109,980 Medicare managed care enrollees (101,189 Whites, 8,791 African Americans) in 321 plans. Participants self-administered the survey and four single-item global ratings of care.


RESULTS
Missing data rates were significantly higher for African Americans than Whites on all CAHPS items (p < .0001). Internal consistency reliability estimates for the CAHPS scales did not differ significantly between African Americans and Whites, but plan-level reliability estimates for the scales and global rating items were significantly lower for African Americans than Whites.


CONCLUSIONS
Higher missing data rates and lower plan-level reliability estimates for African American Medicare managed care enrollees suggest caution in making race/ethnicity comparisons. Future efforts are needed to enhance the quality of data collected from older African Americans.
Fongwa
Marie N
MN
University of California, Los Angeles, USA.
Cunningham
William
W
Weech-Maldonado
Robert
R
Gutierrez
Peter R
PR
Hays
Ron D
RD
D000328:Adult; D001741:Black or African American; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000553:Ambulatory Care; D019538:Health Care Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008329:Managed Care Programs; D006278:Medicare; D008875:Middle Aged; D011787:Quality of Health Care; D012107:Research Design; D014481:United States; D044465:White People