March 2026 | Margaret Koller, Joseph Brecht | 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.