Most Medicare outpatient visits are to physicians with limited clinical information technology.

This Data Bulletin uses linked data from two sources: the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) 2001 5 Percent Carrier File, which contains complete claims for a representative sample of 5 percent of Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries, and the 2001 Center for Studying Health System Change (HSC) Community Tracking Study (CTS) Physician Survey, a nationally representative survey of nearly 12,400 physicians. The linked sample includes claims for more than 506,000 Medicare outpatient visits to 8,641 CTS physicians. Estimates are weighted to be nationally representative of all Medicare fee-for-service physician outpatient visits in 2001. Use of the Medicare data is permitted under a data use agreement between Peter B. Bach, M.D., of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and CMS.