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

Medical University of South Carolina Medical Center

Lung screening gap across 20 counties in South Carolina

120,000to210,000adults in its service area qualify for lung cancer screening and are not being screened

About 2,200 people here are diagnosed with lung cancer each year, and 64% are found at a late stage, when it is hardest to treat.

Explore the screening network
GANCSC
20 counties8 acute care hospitalsService area
140,000 to 260,000adults likely qualify under USPSTF 2021 criteria (estimate)
1,400lung cancer deaths a year in these counties, 2020 to 2024
18.8%of eligible adults screened in the state, 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 Medical University of South Carolina Medical Center'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.

Adults likely eligible, per neighborhood

0+180+250+300+360+440+560+

Acute care hospital in this system

Counties in the service area

CountyAdults likely eligibleLung cancer deaths per 100kMedicare screens billed locally, 2024
Horry County28,300 to 38,90037.31,194
Charleston County14,800 to 35,50026.92,239
Richland County14,800 to 30,90033.576
Lexington County13,900 to 27,00036.756
Beaufort County8,500 to 20,70024.9679
Berkeley County10,700 to 18,20032.5None billed locally
Dorchester County7,400 to 13,40033.622
Florence County7,000 to 12,30039.778
Lancaster County5,100 to 9,20033.3134
Sumter County5,200 to 8,90043.139
Orangeburg County5,000 to 8,40034.8None billed locally
Georgetown County3,700 to 7,40032.093
Kershaw County3,700 to 6,50047.832
Darlington County3,800 to 6,40041.8125
Chester County2,200 to 3,20057.8None billed locally
Williamsburg County2,100 to 3,10033.2None billed locally
Marion County2,300 to 3,00046.1None billed locally
Fairfield County1,600 to 2,50042.3None billed locally
Calhoun County850 to 1,60033.8None billed locally
Bamberg County800 to 1,30047.7None billed locally

8 of the 20 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 18.8% to 23.8%, five points above today, about 7,100 to 12,900 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 64% 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

2,200new lung cancers
1,400found at a late stage
1,400lung cancer deaths

NCI and CDC State Cancer Profiles, annual averages.

Screening at Medical University of South Carolina Medical Center today

Clinicians at Medical University of South Carolina Medical Center locations billed 1,179 low-dose CT lung screening reads to Medicare fee-for-service in 2024. Including Medicare Advantage and other insurers, we estimate about 2,100 to 5,300 screenings a year.

Most adults who qualify see a primary care clinician every year. We count 1,669 primary care clinicians, 41 pulmonologists and 27 thoracic surgeons practicing at Medical University of South Carolina Medical Center 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 Medical University of South Carolina Medical Center 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 (44%, CMS) and, at the high end, by the share of eligible adults under 65 (61%).

8 acute care hospitals

  • Medical University of South Carolina Medical CenterCharleston, SC
  • MUSC Health Columbia Medical Center DowntownColumbia, SC
  • MUSC Health Florence Medical CenterFlorence, SC
  • MUSC Health Kershaw Medical CenterCamden, SC
  • MUSC Health Lancaster Medical CenterLancaster, SC
  • MUSC Health Marion Medical CenterMullins, SC
  • MUSC Health Chester Medical CenterChester, SC
  • MUSC Health - OrangeburgOrangeburg, SC

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 Medical University of South Carolina Medical Center 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 Medical University of South Carolina Medical Center'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.