February is Data Science Month

This February, we'll be taking a deep dive into what it means to be a data scientist and telling stories about the current and future role of data science within OIT and CMS. We’ll explore the latest trends and gain a better understanding of data science through articles, infographics, fact sheets, and videos

Data science is an interdisciplinary field composed of computer science, math and statistics, and domain knowledge to derive insight from data. The goal of data science is to transform data into knowledge, and knowledge into actionable insights. 

Creating a data-driven culture is essential to the future of CMS because it will enable us to extract actionable insights from the data we collect, provide customized products and services, and reduce labor-intensive manual processes. CMS is already using data analytics and machine learning to predict and mitigate fraud, waste, and abuse of reimbursements and resources.

In addition, machine learning is streamlining the collection and analysis of field interviewer comments in the Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey. Where it used to take field supervisors significant time to read, classify, and triage the comments, it is now done automatically. Only a sample needs to be reviewed to ensure the process is working, and to identify possible improvements. 

CMS is a data-rich agency. Applying data science into our work can help us find patterns or insights that are hard to discover through manual investigation.

Data science can help find specific patterns or needs from different customer segments that can be used to create customized products or services. It can automate cumbersome manual data processes, improving efficiency and reducing the time it takes to complete tasks. Most importantly, building a data-driven workforce will help to make smarter, evidence-based decisions to benefit the people we serve.

Keep reading News from OIT all month long to learn more about data science.