Through its data linkage program, NCHS has been able to expand the analytic utility of the data collected from the National Hospital Care Survey (NHCS) by augmenting it with administrative data from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Medicare program. Linkage of NHCS data with the CMS Medicare Data provides the opportunity to conduct a vast array of studies on health care utilization and expenditures among the elderly U.S. population and persons receiving Medicare disability benefits.