Abstract:Several stakeholders have advocated for regionalization of lung cancer surgery to high-volume hospitals. Although regionalization may hold promise for improving postoperative outcomes, competing interests, such as financial disincentives for referring patients outside of a health care system and travel requirements for patients, may hinder its implementation. Limited reports from regional health care systems have raised questions about whether regionalization of lung cancer surgery is spontaneously occurring across the United States. To address this gap, this study investigated national trends in practice patterns and patient travel distances for lung cancer surgery.