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Uninsured lung cancer screenings can cost between $100 and $400, but the New Mexico Cancer Center is offering them free of charge.

"It is a free lung screening. There are no copays. There is no insurance billing, and we do the follow-up navigation with it to provide access and remove barriers," said Tim Tokarski, executive director of the New Mexico Cancer Center Foundation.

Tokarski co-created the program with Dr. Barbara McAneny, co-founder and CEO of the New Mexico Cancer Center.

"We had a discussion a couple of years ago about where we thought we could have some impact, and lung screening was one of them," Tokarski said.

Lung cancer screening rates in New Mexico remain low, Tokarski said. The state's screening rate for residents is 11%, ranking it 49th in the nation, according to the American Lung Association.

Low screening rates often lead to lung cancer being diagnosed at later stages.

"It is clear with diseases that early diagnosis and intervention yield greater outcomes and equities, and so providing an opportunity for people to get screened and catch disease in its earlier state really provides an opportunity for diseases to be cured, or certainly managed," Tokarski said.

According to the National Cancer Institute, the five-year relative survival rate for all types of lung cancer is 65% when the disease is caught early. That rate drops to 10% when it is diagnosed at a later stage.

The screening itself takes about 90 seconds.

Over the past three years, the program has screened 920 people.

Of those screened, 51% had a lung abnormality, and three people were diagnosed with lung cancer.

The screenings have also detected abnormalities affecting the heart, liver, stomach and other organs.

To learn more about the free lung cancer screenings, visit 

Isabella Campbell is an intern with the New Mexico Local 近距离内射合集 Fellowships and Internships Program, which places emerging journalists in newsrooms across New Mexico. Learn more at . She can be reached at icampbell@abqjournal.com.