Oatmeal Healthoatmealhealth.com · public-data estimate, October 2026

Advocate Health

Lung screening gap across 50 counties in Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, North Carolina, South Carolina and Wisconsin

490,000to960,000adults in its service area qualify for lung cancer screening and are not being screened

About 10,200 people here are diagnosed with lung cancer each year, and 65% are found at a late stage, when it is hardest to treat.

Explore the screening network
WIILINMI
50 counties53 acute care hospitalsService areaShowing the Illinois and Wisconsin region; all regions are mapped below.
610,000 to 1.2Madults likely qualify under USPSTF 2021 criteria (estimate)
5,800lung cancer deaths a year in these counties, 2020 to 2024
19.5%of eligible adults screened in these states, vs 18.2% nationally

Estimates from public data only; no patient information. Sources and method below.

Where the eligible adults live

The counties where most of Advocate Health's Medicare inpatients live. Darker areas hold more adults who likely qualify, which is where outreach would start. Hover or tap any area for its estimate.

Illinois and Wisconsin

Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina

Adults likely eligible, per county

0+2,600+5,300+8,900+13,000+16,900+35,600+

Acute care hospital in this system

Counties in the service area

CountyStateAdults likely eligibleLung cancer deaths per 100kMedicare screens billed locally, 2024
Cook CountyIllinois177,400 to 380,40026.98,348
Mecklenburg CountyNorth Carolina35,600 to 79,30025.42,487
DuPage CountyIllinois29,700 to 72,70023.31,418
Milwaukee CountyWisconsin38,400 to 69,50034.33,468
Lake CountyIllinois24,700 to 53,80026.4561
Guilford CountyNorth Carolina23,100 to 43,70032.71,285
Kane CountyIllinois18,600 to 39,70025.3294
Waukesha CountyWisconsin16,100 to 35,60026.0493
Forsyth CountyNorth Carolina17,600 to 32,60036.8380
McHenry CountyIllinois12,800 to 24,60033.7259
York CountySouth Carolina11,300 to 23,80035.391
Brown CountyWisconsin11,900 to 20,30026.0517
Gaston CountyNorth Carolina12,400 to 20,00041.7174
Union CountyNorth Carolina10,100 to 19,40029.9None billed locally
Racine CountyWisconsin10,300 to 16,90035.3None billed locally
Cabarrus CountyNorth Carolina9,200 to 16,80034.9None billed locally
Iredell CountyNorth Carolina9,500 to 16,30033.8349
Davidson CountyNorth Carolina10,400 to 15,90044.3None billed locally
Kenosha CountyWisconsin8,400 to 13,80037.8101
Randolph CountyNorth Carolina9,000 to 13,50047.1None billed locally
Winnebago CountyWisconsin8,200 to 13,50031.2303
Rowan CountyNorth Carolina8,700 to 13,00040.141
Washington CountyWisconsin6,500 to 12,00026.5None billed locally
Bibb CountyGeorgia8,400 to 11,70033.6166
Houston CountyGeorgia6,900 to 11,50031.4223
Sheboygan CountyWisconsin5,900 to 10,00028.2None billed locally
Lancaster CountySouth Carolina5,100 to 9,20033.3134
Cleveland CountyNorth Carolina6,100 to 9,20040.525
Walworth CountyWisconsin5,100 to 8,90028.698
Lincoln CountyNorth Carolina5,400 to 8,50034.938
Ozaukee CountyWisconsin3,700 to 8,10021.1267
Floyd CountyGeorgia5,300 to 8,10041.91,350
Manitowoc CountyWisconsin4,800 to 7,40032.013
Wilkes CountyNorth Carolina4,500 to 6,90041.266
Stanly CountyNorth Carolina3,900 to 5,80047.173
Columbus CountyNorth Carolina3,400 to 5,30048.1None billed locally
Davie CountyNorth Carolina2,400 to 4,40042.1None billed locally
Marinette CountyWisconsin3,000 to 4,10033.537
Baldwin CountyGeorgia2,200 to 3,60035.278
Polk CountyGeorgia2,600 to 3,40051.1None billed locally
Scotland CountyNorth Carolina2,500 to 3,10056.3None billed locally
Cherokee CountyAlabama2,000 to 3,00056.7None billed locally
Jones CountyGeorgia1,600 to 2,60034.556
Monroe CountyGeorgia1,700 to 2,60038.9None billed locally
Polk CountyNorth Carolina1,200 to 2,50022.8None billed locally
Putnam CountyGeorgia1,600 to 2,30023.8None billed locally
Anson CountyNorth Carolina1,600 to 2,30047.5None billed locally
Peach CountyGeorgia1,400 to 2,30045.3None billed locally
Hampton CountySouth Carolina1,300 to 1,80038.4None billed locally
Alleghany CountyNorth Carolina900 to 1,30040.2None billed locally

19 of the 50 counties had no Medicare lung screening reads billed from a local address in 2024. County names link to their Missing Millions page.

What closing the gap would mean

If screening in these counties rose from 19.5% to 24.5%, five points above today, about 30,700 to 59,800 more people would be screened each year.

In the National Lung Screening Trial, low-dose CT screening lowered lung cancer deaths by 20% compared with chest X-ray. Today about 65% of lung cancers here are found at a late stage.

Illustrative estimate: eligible adults (range) times the change in screening rate. Not a forecast or a guarantee.

Each year in these counties

10,200new lung cancers
6,600found at a late stage
5,800lung cancer deaths

NCI and CDC State Cancer Profiles, annual averages.

Screening at Advocate Health today

Clinicians at Advocate Health locations billed 5,511 low-dose CT lung screening reads to Medicare fee-for-service in 2024. Including Medicare Advantage and other insurers, we estimate about 11,600 to 33,400 screenings a year.

Most adults who qualify see a primary care clinician every year. We count 10,053 primary care clinicians, 178 pulmonologists and 81 thoracic surgeons practicing at Advocate Health locations. A 20 pack-year smoking history is often missing from structured EHR fields, so many eligible patients are never flagged.

CMS Medicare Physician and Other Practitioners 2024 (CPT 71271); clinicians matched to Advocate Health by practice address using the AHRQ Compendium of U.S. Health Systems 2023, so reads billed by outside radiology groups are not included. The all-payer estimate scales Medicare fee-for-service by the local Medicare Advantage share (53%, CMS) and, at the high end, by the share of eligible adults under 65 (65%).

53 acute care hospitals

  • Carolinas Medical CenterCharlotte, NC
  • Aurora Health Care Metro Inc.Milwaukee, WI
  • North Carolina Baptist HospitalWinston-Salem, NC
  • Advocate Christ HospitalOak Lawn, IL
  • AHN the Medical CenterMacon, GA
  • Advocate Lutheran General HospitalPark Ridge, IL
  • Atrium Health CabarrusConcord, NC
  • Advocate Southland Health NetworkChicago, IL
  • Atrium Health PinevilleCharlotte, NC
  • Atrium Health ClevelandShelby, NC
  • Advocate Good Samaritan HospitalDowners Grove, IL
  • High Point Medical CenterHigh Point, NC

And 41 more acute care hospitals.

Find them, reach them, give radiologists a second opinion

LungIQ Find

Reads clinical notes, diagnoses and medications in the EHR and returns a ranked list of patients likely eligible, including those whose pack-year history is missing. Start with a CSV export refreshed every 1, 3 or 6 months, or connect through FHIR or HL7.

LungNAV Reach

An AI patient navigator that texts and calls patients in 70+ languages, answers questions about the scan, and hands each patient to your scheduling team or nurse navigators with a call summary.

LungAI Second opinion

Gives radiologists a malignancy risk score for each nodule, factoring in change since the prior scan, inside the PACS and CADe software they already use. The radiologist makes the final call.

LungAI is an investigational medical device and has not been cleared by FDA. It is not commercially available in the United States.

How we estimate the gap

Modeled estimates from public data. They are not a count of Advocate Health patients and contain no patient information.

  • Service area: CMS Hospital Service Area File 2025 (counties within 120 miles of a system hospital holding 80% of its Medicare inpatients, plus any county with at least 1%); hospitals from the AHRQ Compendium of U.S. Health Systems, 2023.
  • Eligible adults, low estimate: Oatmeal Health Missing Millions (Census 2025 population, CDC PLACES smoking, USPSTF 2021).
  • Eligible adults, high estimate: University of Minnesota National Lung Cancer Screening Estimates (Haynes 2026), which also counts former smokers.
  • Screening rate: American Lung Association, State of Lung Cancer 2025.
  • Lung cancer cases and deaths: NCI and CDC State Cancer Profiles (incidence 2019 to 2023, deaths 2020 to 2024).
  • Screening volume: CMS Medicare Physician and Other Practitioners, 2024; CMS Medicare Advantage State/County Penetration, September 2026.

LungAI is an investigational medical device and has not been cleared by FDA. Oatmeal Health is preparing a 510(k) premarket notification. LungAI is not commercially available in the United States.

See Advocate Health's own numbers

In a 30 minute review we replace these public estimates with counts from your own records and agree on what a first program would look like.

Request a private screening review