Factors that affect readiness to change lifestyle: a 22-country survey from primary care

The family physician's task in prevention is not only an assessment of patients' health risks but also counselling individual patients.

Aim of this primary care based study was to find how patients' characteristics relate to their readiness to change.

This multinational cross-sectional survey was conducted in primary care in 22 European countries, coordinated by EUROPREV. Consecutive attenders from randomly selected family practices answered a questionnaire about attitudes towards prevention and about lifestyle.

The questionnaire was answered by 7947 patients in 224 primary care practices in 22 European countries. Smoking was reported by 828 women (23.2%) versus 1238 (32.57%) men, unhealthy diet by 637 (11.6%) women versus 830 men (17.62%), risky alcohol consumption by 348 women (8.19%) versus 1009 men (23.07%) and the lack of physical activity by 617 women (12.68%) versus 614 men (16.45%). The need for change was declared by 432 (31.8%) of 1357 risky drinkers, 612 (29.6%) of 2066 smokers, 1210 (82.4%) of 1467 patients with unhealthy diet and by 2456 (30.9%) of all participants, 1231 of them were not physically active at all. Among patients with unhealthy dietary habits, 681 (56.3%) were confident of successfully changing their behaviour, among physically inactive it was 1561 (63.6 %), among smokers 284 (46.4%), and among risky drinkers 214 (49.5%).

More likely to be ready to change unhealthy lifestyles are frequent attenders, European Union citizens, women and patients under 50 years of age.