Integrating State Data to Promote Evidence-Based Policy: The New Jersey Integrated Population Health Data (iPHD) Project

Which pregnant women are most likely to rely on emergency department care, and how can they be better served? How did COVID-19 affect birth outcomes, and what would support improvements in future infectious disease outbreaks? How have changes in cannabis policy and other substance use trends affected birth outcomes, and what new supports are needed? These and other questions can be answered with existing state data when these data are integrated.

State programs generate demographic, health and social service utilization, and health status information that can help researchers understand the complex and often interconnected factors that impact health. However, due to a confluence of factors, programs rarely share data, greatly limiting their value for program planning, evaluation, and population health research.

In this post, we provide a look at New Jersey’s effort to integrate its data to support rigorous population health research that informs evidence-based policymaking, as well as share operational insights from the project’s implementation. Currently, New Jersey is one of more than 30 states undertaking similar data integration efforts on both the statewide and local levels to inform policy and program planning.

New Jersey’s Unique Approach to Data Integration

Enacted through legislation in 2016, the New Jersey Integrated Population Health Data (iPHD) Project established a formal process for the release of state program and service data to:

1. Facilitate research leading to improvements in the health, safety, security, and well-being of New Jersey residents; and
2. Improve the cost-efficiency of state government programs in these areas.

The project is led by a multi-stakeholder governing board, functions under the auspices of the NJ Department of Health and is operated by the Rutgers University Center for State Health Policy (CSHP). To date, Department of Health has invested a total of $3.4 million in the iPHD with annual appropriations to CSHP. The other funding source includes data access fees paid by approved projects. The project leverages the technical expertise and analytic capacity of CSHP, which has built broadly agreed upon, highly priority population health use cases over the last decade to show how linked data can generate more robust and timely evidence for improving public programs and services.

iPHD Project’s Research Priorities

In June 2018, CSHP convened a stakeholders from the state’s research universities, state agencies, and community organizations to develop the iPHD Project’s initial research priorities (See Figure 1). At the same time, CSHP and NJDOH negotiated agreements to ensure compliant and secure transfer of data into the iPHD and then to approved researchers in the form of limited data sets. This work culminated in the June 2022 Research Consortium, marking the iPHD’s launch and the release of its first Request for Applications.

Figure 1. iPHD Project Research Priorities

During open application cycles, investigators from institutions across and beyond New Jersey can apply for access to one or more of the available datasets and request project-specific linkages.

iPHD Project Impact & Progress to Date

Since operations began in 2022, the iPHD has ingested over 90 million records from five New Jersey Department of Health datasets and has identified matches for over 16 million individuals over time. After receiving administrative data, the iPHD data team standardizes data fields with personally identifiable information to run through probabilistic record matching across all iPHD datasets. These records are anonymized and unique study IDs are assigned, so researchers can then use person-level study IDs to track individuals within and across all available datasets.

Current and Forthcoming Datasets in the iPHD

To date, the governing board has approved the release of data for 34 research projects. A shared priority for both the iPHD Project and state policymakers is improving maternal and child health outcomes; initiatives like Nurture NJ and the NJ Maternal and Infant Health Innovation Authority are helping coordinate research and policy interventions. Researchers from early cycles of the iPHD have begun publishing their work, with preliminary findings now available on topics such as perinatal depression and postpartum emergency department visits and impacts of COVID-19 exposure and substance use disorder on adverse birth outcomes.

Key Reflections for Developing an Integrated Data System

• Creating a culture of compliance rooted in strong data privacy and security policies. An integrated data system requires adherence to rigorous data privacy and protection laws and the technical capacity and expertise to process large, complex datasets. Researchers approved for data access are required to enter into a data use agreement that complies with iPHD data use policies and acceptable use guidelines. These policies were developed in consultation with state agency representatives and data stewards and were approved by the governing board.
  
  The iPHD Project also works closely with the IFH Data Core, a National Institutes of Health-compliant core facility housed within the Rutgers Institute for Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research, to maintain its datasets. In addition to providing a secure environment for maintaining the data, the core provides technical expertise to CSHP as it refines record linkages and prepares datasets for researchers.
  
• Developing scalable data access policies that include new use cases. It is important to revisit and sometimes amend policies to address new use cases and emerging trends. For example, a new policy was recently adopted to facilitate linkage of data sets to other “third-party” data sets that sit outside of the iPHD. It was imperative for the advancement of the iPHD Project that CSHP be able to fulfill these more scientifically complex linkage requests and develop policies that establish guardrails against reidentification. 

• Engaging with broad research and stakeholder constituencies to build and sustain IDS operations across the research and policy spectrum. The iPHD Project’s enabling legislation requires CSHP to convene its research community and help promote the application of scholarship generated through the project. These forums are key to facilitating knowledge sharing among data recipients as well as encouraging new researchers to apply for data access.
  
  In April 2025, CSHP convened a webinar to update the public and iPHD community about application enhancements and new data sets. In October, CSHP hosted a research and planning (online and in-person) meeting, attended by 50 researchers, who learned more about preliminary research findings and shared updates about analyses currently underway. An in-person, statewide iPHD research consortium is planned for 2026.
  
• Balancing timeliness of data release with ensuring rigor and compliance. An operational challenge for the iPHD has been ensuring the timely release of data sets to approved researchers to meet project timelines and allow them to take advantage of funding opportunities. Making new data sets or additional data years of existing data “research ready” is a time-consuming and rigorous process. The process also includes the execution of data agreements that require institutional approval, which can often contribute to delays in data release.

To help expedite the time to data release, in 2025 the iPHD redesigned the external review process to reduce the number of experts who reviewed proposals to better align with other comparable integrated data system mechanisms. Reviews are more targeted to focus on feasibility of data linkage, fit with iPHD research priorities, rigor of research methods, and minimizing data security risks.

What’s Next for the iPHD?

Along with operating under a new governor and integrating new data sets, CSHP is developing researcher affinity groups to connect data-access recipients working on similar topics, or with the same data sets, to share knowledge and identify best practices. While barriers to collaboration exist, so too do opportunities to establish new relationships and expand the network of researchers that can ultimately maximize the impact of iPHD data and improve population health.