Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey - Survey File

Principal Investigator(s):  View help for Principal Investigator(s) United States Department of Health and Human Services. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

Version:  View help for Version V2

Name File Type Size Last Modified
  Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey - Survey File 04/08/2025 04:47:PM
MCBSPUFDisclaimer.pdf application/pdf 81.8 KB 04/08/2025 12:48:PM

Project Citation: 

United States Department of Health and Human Services. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey - Survey File. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2026-04-18. https://doi.org/10.3886/E226004V2

Project Description

Project Title:  View help for Project Title Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey - Survey File
Summary:  View help for Summary
The Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey (MCBS) - Survey File Microdata Public Use File (PUF) dataset provides information on topics such as Medicare beneficiaries' access to care, health status, other information regarding beneficiaries’ knowledge of, attitudes toward, and satisfaction with their health care, as well as demographic data and information on all types of health insurance coverage.

Resources for Using and Understanding the Data

This dataset is based on information from the MCBS and administrative data. The MCBS is a continuous, multi-purpose longitudinal survey covering a representative national sample of the Medicare population, including the population of beneficiaries aged 65 and over and beneficiaries aged 64 and below with certain disabling conditions. The MCBS collects this information in three data collection periods, or rounds, per year. Disclosure protections have been applied to the file, including de-identification and other methods. As a result, the MCBS Survey File Microdata file does not require a Data Use Agreement (DUA). In contrast, the MCBS Limited Data Set (LDS) releases contain beneficiary-level protected health information (PHI) and therefore require a DUA. The MCBS - Survey File Microdata file is not intended to replace the more detailed LDS files but, rather, it makes available a general-use publicly-available alternative that provides the highest degree of protection to the Medicare beneficiaries’ PHI. The main benefits of using the MCBS - Survey File Microdata file are:
  1. Increased data access for researchers of the MCBS through a free file download that is consistent with other U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) public-use survey files.
  2. Enhanced potential for policy-relevant analyses, by attracting new researchers and policymakers. Accessing the MCBS LDS can be a significant deterrent due to the associated costs and time but the MCBS - Survey File Microdata file mitigates these barriers to encourage broader utilization.
 A link to the more detailed MCBS LDS files is provided in the Resources section on this page. MCBS LDS data are also presented in the MCBS Chartbook linked in the Visualization section on this page.

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Microdata: Yes                                                                                    
Level of Analysis: --                                             
Variables Present: Yes                                                    
File Layout: .csv; .xpt                                                                              
Codebook: Yes                                                                      
Methods: Yes                                         
Weights (with appropriate documentation): Yes                            
Publications: Yes                                                                              
Aggregate Data: Yes
Original Distribution URL:  View help for Original Distribution URL https://data.cms.gov/medicare-current-beneficiary-survey-mcbs/medicare-current-beneficiary-survey-survey-file

Scope of Project

Subject Terms:  View help for Subject Terms Medicare; elderly ; disabled
Geographic Coverage:  View help for Geographic Coverage United States
Time Period(s):  View help for Time Period(s) 2017 – 2022


Related Publications

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Published Versions

V2 [2026-04-18]

V1 [2025-04-08]

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DDI 2.5

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This material is distributed exactly as received from the data depositor. ICPSR has not reviewed, checked, or processed this material. For additional information about the study, please contact the investigator(s) directly. If you have questions about the accessibility of materials distributed by ICPSR or require further assistance, please visit ICPSR's Accessibility Center.