OBJECTIVES: The use of administrative datasets can be a useful tool in cancer surveillance by providing disease patterns, utilization of services, and patient characteristics. This study explores characteristics of treatment and staging among lung cancer patients in the US using hospital-based services. METHODS: A cross-sectional study of chemotherapy treated lung cancer patients receiving in or out-patient services from hospitals in MedAssets’ health data from July 1, 2010 to June 30, 2011 were assessed for staging and treatment characteristics. The Thomas, et al. staging algorithm was applied to patient services to estimate stage of lung cancer. Descriptive statistics were calculated for the sample by stage, treatment characteristics, procedures and hospital characteristics. Patterns of care were tabulated and compared by cancer stage. RESULTS: The sample included 14,628 unique patients who received chemotherapy during the study period spanning over 217,000 hospital visits. The majority (75%) of hospital visits were classified as stage 1-2 compared to stage 3-4 (25%). Stage 1-2 patients experienced fewer hospital visits (5.9 vs. 12.5, p <0.0001) and had a significantly higher proportion of inpatient stays (22.1% vs. 6.7%, p <0.0001).  Most visits (88.7%) occurred in hospital-based outpatient facilities. There were 52,289 (3.1 visits per patient) chemotherapy related visits. Primary chemotherapies included: pemetrexed disodium (16.2 %), carboplatin (34.3%) and cisplatin (11.0%). Blood transfusions and other non-surgical procedures made up the largest portion (25.4%) of all procedures performed on both groups. Finally, both groups were treated in primarily in large (>300 beds, 75.1%), urban (90.1%), and teaching (59.1%) hospitals. CONCLUSIONS: The cross-sectional analysis demonstrates the possible value of large-scale administrative data sets in illuminating differences in treatment characteristic in a chemotherapy-treated lung cancer population. Future analysis should evaluate the use of these data to help predict utilization and treatment patterns in larger populations.