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Update Notes

MEPS HC-024: 1996 Person Round Plan File

Update #4: 11/22/13

SPSS and STATA Programming Statements have been added.


Update #3: 12/27/10

The value of COVTYPIN (single or family coverage) was incorrectly set for a small number of plans. These cases have all four of the following conditions: (1) every coresiding family member’s coverage ceased before the end of the reference period (interview date or December 31st, so that EVALCOVR≠1), (2) the policyholder was a coresiding family member, (3) the plan did not cover anyone residing elsewhere, and (4) at least one coresiding dependent had coverage during the reference period. In these cases, COVTYPIN was erroneously set to single. Beginning in 2010, if coverage ceased for every coresiding family member before the end of the reference period, COVTYPIN is set to family if there were two or more persons covered any time during the reference period. Users can reset the values for these cases in prior years with the available data. An example in SAS follows:

proc sort data=h111 out=prpl;
by eprsidx;
run;
data eprs(keep=eprsidx numin numever);
set prpl;
by eprsidx;
retain numin numever;
array stat{24} status1-status24;
if first.eprsidx then do; numin=0; numever=0; end;
if substr(dupersid,6,3) ne '901' then do;
do i=1 to 24; if stat{i}=1 then covered=1; end;
if covered=1 then numever=numever+1;
if evalcovr=1 then numin=numin+1;
end;
if last.eprsidx then output eprs;
run;
data prplx(drop=numin numever covtypin rename=(covtypix=covtypin));
merge prpl eprs;
by eprsidx;
if numin=0 and covtypin=1 and numever>1 then covtypix=2;
else covtypix=covtypin;
label covtypix='COVERAGE: 1=SINGLE, 2=FAMILY';
run;


Update #2: 09/30/03

The variable LTCINS contains household reports of long term care insurance, but estimates of the prevalence of long term care insurance do not benchmark well to data from the insurance industry.  The variable LTCINS should not be used and will not be released in future files.


Update #1: 03/17/03

Due to a data editing error, the values of the variable COBRA are not accurate on some records for rounds 2 and 3. For round 2, the problem arose in editing some round 2 values of COBRA to reflect COBRA status reported first in round 1, specifically in some cases when the coverage reported in round 1 continued in round 2. Round 3 had the same problem, which also led to some COBRA coverage first reported in round 1 not being used in editing round 3. This will not be a problem in the 1997 Person Round Plan file and files for subsequent years.

The following SAS code will correct the problem:

Data work.prpl1 work.prpl2 work.prpl3;
   Set h24(keep=ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX RN COBRA PHOLDER EPCPIDX);
    If PHOLDER=1 & RN=1 & COBRA in (-9,-8,1,2) then output work.prpl1;
    Else if RN=2 & COBRA in (-9,2) then output work.prpl2;
    Else output work.prpl3;

Proc sort data=work.prpl1(keep=ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX COBRA);
    By ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX;

Proc sort data=work.prpl2;
   By ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX;

Data work.prpl4;
   Merge work.prpl1(in=A rename=(COBRA=COBRA2)) 
                work.prpl2(in=B);
   By ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX;
   If B;
   If A then COBRA=COBRA2;
   Drop COBRA2;

Data work.prpl5 work.prpl6;
   Set work.prpl3 work.prpl4;
    If PHOLDER=1 & RN=2 & COBRA in (-9,-8,1,2) then output work.prpl5;
    Else if RN=3 & COBRA in (-9,2) then output work.prpl6;

Proc sort data=work.prpl5(keep=ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX COBRA);
   By ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX;

Proc sort data=work.prpl6;
    By ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX;

Data work.prpl7;
    Merge work.prpl5(in=A rename=(COBRA=COBRA2)) 
              work.prpl6(in=B);
    By ESTBIDX PHLDRIDX;
   If B;
   If A then COBRA=COBRA2;
    Drop COBRA2;

Proc sort data=work.prpl4(keep=EPCPIDX COBRA);
    By EPCPIDX;

Proc sort data=work.prpl7(keep=EPCPIDX COBRA);
   By EPCPIDX;

Proc sort data=h24;
   By EPCPIDX;

Data h24cobra;
   Merge h24 
                 work.prpl4(in=A e=(COBRA=COBRA2))
                 work.prpl7(in=B rename=(COBRA=COBRA3));
    By EPCPIDX;
   If A then COBRA=COBRA2;
   If B then COBRA=COBRA3;
    Drop COBRA2 COBRA3;

After running this SAS code, the frequency of the corrected COBRA variable is:

COBRA COVERAGE: 1=YES, 2=NO
 
COBRA Frequency Percent Cumulative 
Frequency
Cumulative 
Percent

-9 1073 2.11 1073 2.11
-8 114 0.22 1187 2.34
-7 2 0.00 1189 2.34
-1 43557 85.78 44746 88.12
1 1915 3.77 46661 91.89
2 4117 8.11 50778 100.00



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