NIH, CMS Partner to Advance Understanding of Autism Through Secure Access to Select Medicare and Medicaid Data

WASHINGTON, DC—MAY 7, 2025—The National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) today announced a landmark partnership to enable NIH to build a real-world data platform enabling advanced research across claims data, electronic medical records, and consumer wearables. 

This partnership will focus first on enabling research around the root causes of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). In the long term, the partnership will link real-world data, in a manner consistent with applicable privacy laws to protect Americans’ sensitive health information, for research on chronic conditions—a core priority of President Trump and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.