The European Health Examination Survey - Joint Action (EHES-JA) has been established to provide an overview of the health and health risks of the European adult population through the implementation of health examination surveys (HES) in 14 countries. This Joint Action will test and evaluate the applicability of the recommendations prepared by the Feasibility of a European Health Examination Survey (FEHES) project in different cultures and health care systems with the aim of achieving comparability between data from different countries. The EHES Reference Centre (RC) is the coordinating centre for the European Health Examination Surveys. The EHES RC is established jointly by the National Institute for Health and Welfare from Finland, Istituto superiore di sanità from Italy and Statistics Norway. The EHES RC develops and maintains the European level standards for the health examination surveys, provides support and training for the countries conducting national HES, and evaluates the quality of data collected during the national HESs.

Four in ten deaths of Europeans are currently caused by cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack and stroke, many of whom are of working age. Many others will become incapacitated due to the same diseases. The major modifiable risk factors for cardiovascular diseases - obesity, blood pressure, smoking, cholesterol and diabetes - are well-known and common to many chronic-degenerative diseases, but data on risk factors levels and trends among European populations are scarce. In addition, when data are available, they are not comparable between countries as collected following different procedures. For many health indicators, an health examination survey of a random sample of the general population is the most reliable data source.

A preparation and pilot phase has already started in 14 participating countries: Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain and UK/England. This first phase of the project is planned to be completed in the majority of participating countries by the end of 2011. A sample of 200 adults will be examined during the pilot phase. The survey consists of a questionnaire on important background information (age, sex, socio-economic status, health behaviours and health status), physical measurements (weight, height, waist circumference, blood pressure) and blood samples (cholesterols, fasting glucose).

The EHES will provide reliable and comparable data for the national and Europe-wide planning and evaluation of health policies, prevention and health promotion activities.

To Know more visite the European Health Examination Survey web site.