Missing Millions · 2026 estimate
Anderson County, Tennessee is missing 4,600 lung cancer screenings.
About 1 in 6 adults ages 50 to 80 here qualifies for lung cancer screening and hasn't been screened. Low-dose CT finds lung cancer early, when it is most treatable.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates 2025; CDC PLACES 2025; USPSTF 2021; American Lung Association, State of Lung Cancer 2025. Modeled estimates; see methodology below.
How Anderson County compares
Adults ages 50 to 80 who qualify for screening and haven't been screened.
Modeled estimates; national figures from American Lung Association, State of Lung Cancer 2025.
Closing the gap
Raising screening here to the national rate of 18.2% would mean about 180 more people screened each year.
Illustrative estimate based on the county's estimated eligible population.
Who is missing
Age
53% are ages 50 to 64
Of adults ages 50 to 80 here, 53% are 50 to 64 and 47% are 65 to 80. Younger adults are often still working and outside Medicare.
Smoking history
33% quit smoking
Of adults here who likely qualify, 33% are former smokers. They qualify for 15 years after quitting, but quit dates are rarely in the medical record, so they are the easiest to miss.
Language
2% limited English
2% of adults here speak English less than very well, most often Spanish.
Screening today
254 Medicare scans
Providers based in Anderson County billed 254 low-dose CT screening scans to Medicare fee-for-service in 2024, across 6 billing providers. See the local network in the Lung Screening Atlas
Sources: age, U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates 2025; smoking history, University of Minnesota National Lung Cancer Screening Estimates (Haynes 2026); language, American Community Survey 2020 to 2024 (table B16004), adults 18 and older; screening, CMS Medicare Physician and Other Practitioners 2024 (CPT 71271), by billing provider location.
Lung cancer in Anderson County
Each year, on average. Screening finds lung cancer early, when it is most treatable.
Diagnosed
87 a year
New lung and bronchus cancers, 2019 to 2023 average.
Found late
64% at a late stage
About 56 a year are found after the cancer has spread, when it is hardest to treat.
Deaths
55 a year
Lung cancer deaths, 2020 to 2024 average.
Death rate
45.8 per 100,000
Lung cancer deaths, age-adjusted, compared with 30.2 nationally.
Source: National Cancer Institute and CDC, State Cancer Profiles. Counts under 16 a year are suppressed by NCI and not shown.
Health systems serving Anderson County
Health systems whose patients come from Anderson County, based on where their Medicare inpatients live. Each page shows the system's full service area, lung cancer data and screening today.
- Community Health SystemsScreening gap page
- Covenant HealthScreening gap page
- East Tennessee Childrens Hospital AssociationScreening gap page
- University of Tennessee Medical CenterScreening gap page
Lung Screening Atlas: CMS Hospital Service Area File 2025 and the AHRQ Compendium of U.S. Health Systems, 2023.
Other Tennessee counties
- Shelby County40,300 missing
- Davidson County22,500 missing
- Knox County20,100 missing
- Hamilton County16,600 missing
- Rutherford County12,700 missing
- Sullivan County10,300 missing
- Sumner County9,300 missing
- Williamson County8,000 missing
Methodology
How we estimate the gap
A modeled estimate from public data only. It is not a count of patients and contains no patient information.
missing = adults 50 to 80 × county smoking rate × national eligibility factor × (1 − state screening rate)
- Adults 50 to 80: U.S. Census Bureau, Population Estimates, Vintage 2025
- Smoking: CDC PLACES 2025 release (Kentucky and Pennsylvania: 2024 release)
- Eligibility: USPSTF 2021 criteria, scaled to about 14.5 million eligible adults nationally
- Screening rates: American Lung Association, State of Lung Cancer 2025
- Who is missing: Census population estimates (age) and American Community Survey 2020 to 2024 (language)
- Screening activity: CMS Medicare fee-for-service claims for low-dose CT (CPT 71271), 2024, by provider location
- Lung cancer cases and deaths: National Cancer Institute and CDC, State Cancer Profiles (incidence 2019 to 2023, deaths 2020 to 2024)
- Smoking history: University of Minnesota National Lung Cancer Screening Estimates (Haynes 2026)
Estimates under 50 are shown as "fewer than 50"; others are rounded. Full methodology
Many of them are already your patients.
Oatmeal Health helps health systems and community health centers find, navigate, and screen the people who qualify, alongside the care teams you already have.
Get the free Anderson County report
A printable PDF with the local estimate, how it compares, who is missing, the local screening network, and our full methodology.
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