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Screening in Lithuania

Lithuania runs five funded prevention programmes and delivers all of them through the family doctor rather than by invitation letter. Breast screening was widened to 45–74 at the start of 2025.

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.

The programmes

No letter, so the appointment is yours to make

Lithuania funds prevention through the compulsory health insurance fund and routes every programme through the family doctor with whom you are registered. There is no national call-and-recall letter. The practical consequence is that attendance depends on you booking, and on the practice remembering to raise it — so the useful habit is to ask at any appointment you are already attending: "am I in any of the prevention programmes this year?" The tests themselves cost nothing.

Breast screening now starts at 45

Until the end of 2024 the mammography programme covered women aged 50 to 69. From 1 January 2025 it covers women aged 45 to 74, invited by the family doctor once every two years — a change that follows the European recommendation to widen the band beyond the old 50–69 core. Five extra years at the young end and five at the old end is a large expansion, and if you turned 45 recently the offer is new enough that you may need to raise it yourself.

Cervical, bowel and prostate

Cervical screening covers women aged 25 to 59 with a cytology sample every three years. Bowel screening covers everyone aged 50 to 74 with a faecal occult blood test every two years. Prostate is the distinctive one: Lithuania funds a PSA test every two years for men aged 50 to 69, and from 45 for men with a first-degree family history — a much more permissive position than Sweden, which recommends against organised PSA screening altogether. Both positions are defensible on the same evidence, which tells you how genuinely finely balanced prostate screening is.

The cardiovascular programme

Alongside the cancer programmes there is a funded cardiovascular risk programme: a yearly check with the family doctor for adults in the relevant age band, covering blood glucose, cholesterol and triglycerides, an ECG and a risk assessment, with a personalised prevention plan if you come out in the high-risk group. The age band has been revised recently, so ask your practice what the current one is rather than relying on a figure you read anywhere — including here.

Age by age

The same table again, turned around: every age at which something falls due, so you can find your own and read across. This is rendered on the server, so it works whether or not the calculator below does.

Women: the age ladder

Men: the age ladder

Where an interval is set regionally, only the age the band opens is listed — the country’s own body publishes the repeat interval. Ages are the age you reach in the calendar year, because target groups across the region are built from birth years rather than birth dates.

Work out your own years

Sources: Valstybinė ligonių kasa (National Health Insurance Fund) — disease prevention programmes · Nacionalinis vėžio institutas — breast cancer early diagnosis programme · checked 2026-09-07

Perguntas frequentes

The tests you will be invited to

The other countries

Age bands differ across the region by up to a decade for the same programme, so a comparison is genuinely useful — particularly if you have moved, or if family live elsewhere.

Estonia · Finland · Latvia · Sweden · Norway · Denmark

The whole regional tableHow invitations work