UMBC’s CIDER Program Supports New Hilltop Institute-led Medicaid Study, Other Cross-collaborative Projects

UMBC researchers are collaborating on a study that takes a closer look at specific diagnosis coding patterns that focus on societal factors that potentially influence the health of Maryland’s Medicaid recipients. Morgan Henderson, director of analytics and research at UMBC’s The Hilltop Institute, and Jun Chu, assistant professor of public health, are among the five cross-collaborative teams selected to receive funding from UMBC’s Center and Institute Departmentally-Engaged Research (CIDER) program. Henderson and Chu’s CIDER-supported project will investigate potential “z code” patterns of the state’s Medicaid recipients. Z codes are a set of diagnosis codes that refer to factors influencing a patient’s health status beyond diseases or injuries, called social determinants of health.