First Time User of HDS?
Let us walk you through how to order your cost report information!
Step One: Find a Report
Looking for Information on a Specific Hospital?
The Health Data Store’s cost report search engine will help you find the data for the hospital or hospitals for the time period you are seeking. The first column lets you search for a specific hospital based on its identifying information – State, County, Medicare Provider Number, Hospital Name, City, Zip Code, and distance from a particular Zip Code. You can fill out as many or as few fields as you’d like to narrow the search results to a specific hospital or set of hospitals.
Looking for Information on a Type of Hospital?
The second column will help you find a type of hospital based on some of its key characteristics – Type of Facility, Type of Control, Bed Size, Annual Discharges, Total Patient Revenue, and Urban/Rural designation. Entering values in multiple search fields will bring back only results that meet all the criteria you entered. Select whichever criteria best fit your search needs; you do not need to select all criteria.
When you’ve decided which hospital(s)s or types of hospital(s) you are interested in, click search to see what the Health Data Store has available.
Step 2: Choose a Report
The results page will list the top 30 hospitals, if there are that many, matching your search criteria. Simply click the arrow to the left of the hospital name to see the list of cost reports by year available for that provider. Some hospitals will have multiple reports available for the same time period – the Health Data Store has made cost reports available through their various audit and final stages where data is present. When you have found the cost report you want to see, click View Report.
Step 3: Preview and Purchase a Report
When you select a report, you can navigate a preview of it within your web browser. The navigation bar at the top of the screen lists all the available worksheets in that particular selected cost report. Those in gray are produced by the Health Data Store but not present in that selected cost report. Just click on the worksheet and part you want to view, and the preview will load. Worksheets with multiple components (e.g., Medicare, Medicaid, SNF, etc.) have a drop down menu allowing you to select a component.
The preview will show you which cells on a worksheet contain data. The presence of data is indicated with an “#.” Blank cells on the preview mean there is no data in that cell on the report.
When you are ready to buy a report, click Add to Cart. Once you’ve added all the reports you wish to buy to your cart, click Check Out. If you are not yet logged in, you’ll be prompted to do so or sign up as a registered user. After you’ve checked out, the report(s) will be in your account and the “#” marks on available worksheets will be replaced with the actual data from that report. Additionally, you’ll be able to download the cost report in Excel and PDF formats and save them to your computer. If you have interest in multiple reports during a year, you may be interested in a Premium Account which allows unlimited access for an annual fee. At any time, you can add a Premium Account to your cart, and, once you’ve checked out, be able to view the full report for any report the Health Data Store offers!
Step 4: View your Purchased Data!
Click on the “My Account” tab to view what reports you’ve recently purchased and how soon until they expire. Reports can be viewed online or downloaded in PDF or Excel for 30 days after purchase. Premium Account customers can restore expired reports to their accounts at no additional cost. Customers purchasing individual reports will have to repurchase an expired report. Click on the “View Report” link to take to you to the navigation page for unexpired cost reports in your account. If you wish to add more reports to your account, click on the “Cost Reports” tab and begin searching again.
If you have more questions, need a custom report from the HCRIS data or any of the other data holdings of the Health Data Store, or have any problems with your account, you can contact the DataMeister at DataMeister@healthdatastore.com.