Medicaid, opioid abuse, the effects of extreme weather on asthma, child eye exam coverage, and records generated by every Arizona pharmacist, nurse and physician since 2007: The Center for Health Information and Research has access to data on all of it.

And now it has a new director, Marisa Domino. 

Marisa Domino, a health economist and health services researcher, has been tapped to lead this unique data center housed in the College of Health Solutions on ASU’s Downtown Phoenix campus. 

The Center for Health Information and Research — called CHiR for short — is Arizona’s first and only comprehensive health care data analytics repository of local health records. 

Founded in 1999, CHiR’s analysts have mined big data sets for the past 23 years to help researchers and policymakers better address health issues ranging from vision care for children to the cost of chronic mental illness.

Domino grew up in Tucson, Arizona, and has returned to Arizona by way of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she was a professor of health economics and a research fellow at the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research. She also served as director of the center’s program on mental health and substance abuse services and systems, and led its mental health systems and services research training program. In addition, she directed UNC’s PhD program in health policy and management.

“Data and information are key to improving any health outcome, and I chose Dr. Domino to be the leader who will broaden our collaborative efforts in this area,” said Deborah Helitzer, dean of the College of Health Solutions. “Her research expertise and ability to work closely with community stakeholders will help us to further embed CHiR in the ASU ecosystem, partner with organizations statewide to address the needs for health information, and advance our mission and the goal of ASU’s charter to improve the health of the communities we serve.”

Throughout her career, Domino has used data to make sense of problems in health care systems with the aim of improving health outcomes. One of her first projects at UNC, for example, was research to understand the sudden spikes in Medicaid spending in North Carolina during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Since then, she has worked frequently on policy issues affecting Medicaid populations and providers, issues especially important in her current role as CHiR’s director because the center has access to the entire Medicaid database for Arizona.

Read more on chs.asu.edu.