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Diabetes and prediabetes checks
Type 2 diabetes is typically present for years before it is diagnosed. There is no invitation programme, but there is a well-validated Finnish risk questionnaire that decides who needs the blood test.
This page describes screening programmes; it is not a diagnosis, not a personal risk assessment and not a substitute for your own health service. Age bands are set nationally and change — the invitation you receive, and the body named on your country page, outrank anything written here. Screening is for people without symptoms: a new lump, blood you can see, a mole that has changed, unexplained weight loss or a sudden change in vision or hearing needs a clinician now, whatever a recent screening result said.
Where it is organised
Nowhere in this region as an invitation programme. That is a decision rather than an oversight, and the section below explains the reasoning. It also means nothing will arrive in the post: if this is something you want checked, you have to ask for it.
Why it hides
Type 2 diabetes develops over years, and the classic symptoms — thirst, passing urine at night, tiredness, blurred vision, slow-healing wounds — arrive late and are easy to attribute to age, work or the season. A substantial share of people are diagnosed only when a complication appears, and some are diagnosed by an optician who sees retinal changes at a routine eye test. That is the argument for testing on risk rather than waiting for symptoms: the damage to eyes, kidneys, nerves and arteries begins before the diagnosis does.
The questionnaire that decides
FINDRISC is a Finnish-developed risk score that has become the standard first step across much of Europe, and it needs no blood at all. It asks age, body mass index, waist circumference, physical activity, how often you eat vegetables and fruit, whether you have ever taken blood pressure medication, whether you have ever had a high blood glucose reading, and family history. The total predicts the probability of developing type 2 diabetes over the following decade, and a high score is the trigger for an actual blood test. Using it well is what stops the health system testing everyone and finding nothing.
What the blood test shows
HbA1c measures the proportion of haemoglobin that has sugar attached, which reflects average blood glucose over the previous two to three months and needs no fasting. The internationally used diagnostic threshold is 48 mmol/mol, equivalent to 6.5 per cent. Below that but raised — commonly quoted as 42 to 47 mmol/mol — is the high-risk or prediabetes band, and it matters, because that is the stage at which the trajectory is most easily changed. Fasting glucose and the oral glucose tolerance test are the alternatives, and pregnancy is tested differently, with a tolerance test rather than HbA1c.
What a high-risk result is actually for
This is the one area where a screening result comes with an intervention that is genuinely proven. Large randomised trials of structured lifestyle programmes — modest weight loss, regular activity, dietary change — in people with impaired glucose tolerance showed substantial reductions in progression to type 2 diabetes, and the Finnish Diabetes Prevention Study is one of the landmark trials. A prediabetes result is not a diagnosis of an inevitable disease. It is the most actionable number most people will ever be given, and it decays into a diagnosis mostly when nothing is done with it.
Sources: FINDRISC type 2 diabetes risk score, developed in Finland · World Health Organization — use of HbA1c 48 mmol/mol (6.5%) in the diagnosis of diabetes · checked 2026-09-07
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How do I know if I should be tested for diabetes?
Fill in the FINDRISC questionnaire. It asks about age, waist, weight, activity, diet, blood pressure medication, previous high glucose readings and family history, and a high score is the trigger for a blood test.
What HbA1c means diabetes?
48 mmol/mol, or 6.5 per cent, is the usual diagnostic threshold. Values below it but raised — commonly 42 to 47 mmol/mol — describe a high-risk or prediabetes state.
Do I need to fast for an HbA1c test?
No. HbA1c reflects average glucose over the previous two to three months, so it can be taken at any time of day. Fasting glucose and the glucose tolerance test are the tests that require preparation.
Is prediabetes reversible?
The trajectory is changeable, and this is unusually well evidenced. Randomised trials of structured lifestyle programmes in people with impaired glucose tolerance, including the Finnish Diabetes Prevention Study, showed large reductions in progression to type 2 diabetes.
The rest of the surface
Breast cancer screening (mammography)
An X-ray of each breast, read by two radiologists, repeated every two years across a band of ages that starts at 40 in Sweden and 50 almost everywhere else. What it finds, what it misses and what a call-back means.
Cervical screening (HPV test)
Almost every country in the region has switched from looking for abnormal cells to looking for the virus that causes them. The test is better, so the gap between tests is longer — and in several countries you can now take the sample yourself.
Bowel cancer screening (stool test)
A sample from one bowel movement, taken at home and posted. It is the only screening programme in the region that routinely prevents cancers rather than only finding them early — because the follow-up removes the polyp.
Prostate screening (PSA)
Latvia and Lithuania fund PSA testing for men in their fifties and sixties. Sweden assessed the same evidence and recommends against an organised programme. Here is what the trials actually found.
Lung cancer screening (low-dose CT)
The trials are positive and the European recommendation asks countries to build programmes stepwise. In this region it is still pilots rather than invitations — but the eligibility rule is worth knowing.
What screening can and cannot do
Overdiagnosis, false positives, interval cases and lead-time bias — the four ideas behind every disagreement between countries.
All 27 screening pagesIf the result is not normal
The record that makes the appointment shorter
TempoLife keeps weight, blood pressure, sleep and symptoms in one place, so the questions you get asked at a screening appointment already have answers.