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

Banner Health

Lung screening gap across 18 counties in Arizona, California, Colorado, Nebraska, Nevada and Wyoming

230,000to490,000adults in its service area qualify for lung cancer screening and are not being screened

About 3,700 people here are diagnosed with lung cancer each year, and 60% are found at a late stage, when it is hardest to treat.

Explore the screening network
NVUTNMAZ
18 counties29 acute care hospitalsService areaShowing the Arizona region; all regions are mapped below.
270,000 to 580,000adults likely qualify under USPSTF 2021 criteria (estimate)
2,300lung cancer deaths a year in these counties, 2020 to 2024
15.4%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 Banner 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.

Arizona

Colorado, Nebraska and Wyoming

California and Nevada

Adults likely eligible, per neighborhood

0+180+250+300+350+410+490+

Acute care hospital in this system

Counties in the service area

CountyStateAdults likely eligibleLung cancer deaths per 100kMedicare screens billed locally, 2024
Maricopa CountyArizona154,600 to 342,70023.52,977
Pima CountyArizona39,300 to 92,70022.81,678
Pinal CountyArizona22,200 to 39,60023.9None billed locally
Yavapai CountyArizona14,500 to 26,70026.974
Larimer CountyColorado11,300 to 25,00018.9744
Weld CountyColorado12,700 to 22,20021.5None billed locally
Coconino CountyArizona4,700 to 9,90015.055
Natrona CountyWyoming3,800 to 6,90028.3341
Gila CountyArizona3,700 to 5,90024.790
Churchill CountyNevada1,400 to 2,40031.926
Morgan CountyColorado1,200 to 2,30026.2None billed locally
Lassen CountyCalifornia1,400 to 1,90022.1None billed locally
Logan CountyColorado1,100 to 1,80022.9None billed locally
Goshen CountyWyoming660 to 1,40032.5None billed locally
Platte CountyWyoming550 to 96022.8None billed locally
Washakie CountyWyoming460 to 81026.1None billed locally
Keith CountyNebraska470 to 80030.914
Phillips CountyColorado210 to 320—None billed locally

9 of the 18 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 15.4% to the national rate of 18.2%, about 7,700 to 16,500 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 60% 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

3,700new lung cancers
2,200found at a late stage
2,300lung cancer deaths

NCI and CDC State Cancer Profiles, annual averages.

Screening at Banner Health today

Clinicians at Banner Health locations billed 1,108 low-dose CT lung screening reads to Medicare fee-for-service in 2024. Including Medicare Advantage and other insurers, we estimate about 2,300 to 5,900 screenings a year.

Most adults who qualify see a primary care clinician every year. We count 2,809 primary care clinicians, 52 pulmonologists and 24 thoracic surgeons practicing at Banner 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 Banner 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 (51%, CMS) and, at the high end, by the share of eligible adults under 65 (62%).

29 acute care hospitals

  • Banner - University Medical Center PhoenixPhoenix, AZ
  • Banner Desert Medical CenterMesa, AZ
  • Banner - University Medical Center Tucson CampusTucson, AZ
  • Banner Thunderbird Medical CenterGlendale, AZ
  • Banner Boswell Medical CenterSun City, AZ
  • Banner del E Webb Medical CenterSun City West, AZ
  • Banner Baywood Medical CenterMesa, AZ
  • Banner Estrella Medical CenterPhoenix, AZ
  • Wyoming Medical CenterCasper, WY
  • Banner Gateway Medical CenterGilbert, AZ
  • North Colorado Medical CenterGreeley, CO
  • Banner University Med Center SouthTucson, AZ

And 17 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 Banner 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 Banner 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