Turquoise Preference of the CSV Tall Format

As of 7/1/24, CMS requires hospital MRFs to be published in one of three file formats: CSV tall, CSV wide, or a JSON schema. At Turquoise, we prefer to produce CSV tall files.

While CSV wide files can be more individually accessible due to their compatibility with Microsoft Excel, the files often become impractically wide and contain over 500 columns. This makes wide files less ideal for a program to generate, and MRFs are required by definition to be first and foremost machine-readable.

CSV tall files, on the other hand, are technically efficient and concise. Although the JSON schema is highly logical and structured, JSON file creation is less familiar to most people involved with hospital MRF generation, which can hinder hospitals' ability to understand and utilize their own files. Ensuring hospitals are confident that they can comprehend their MRFs is crucial, as they are ultimately responsible for regulatory compliance.