Hospital characteristics associated with surgery for non-small cell lung cancer

6543 Background: Previous research suggests that black patients are less likely to undergo curative-intent surgery for early stage non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) compared to whites, holding all else constant. Among Medicare beneficiaries 65 and older, the likelihood of patients undergoing surgery is significantly reduced in hospitals with racial compositions of > 30% black patients after controlling for hospital and patient characteristics. This study analyzes whether hospital racial composition is associated with curative-intent surgery among early stage NSCLC patients of all ages. Methods: All adult patients ages 19–104 diagnosed with an invasive initial primary early stage (TNM I-II) NSCLC during 2003–2005 were selected from the National Cancer Data Base (NCDB). Facility characteristics were extracted from the NCDB and American College of Surgeons (ACoS) Commission on Cancer (CoC) Facility Information Profile System (FIPS). Hospital racial composition of lung cancer patients, operationalized as per...