Advances in medicine have drastically prolonged life expectancy, but healthy life expectancy is something you have to work on yourself.
Health checks motivate you to obtain and maintain a healthy lifestyle by helping you monitor your health status and making clear what should be improved.
The primary issue in medical checkups is the prevention of the major aging-related disease, artherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, often preceded by conditions such as hypertension, dyslipidemia and diabetes.
Prevention of orthopedic disorders ensuing from frailty is another issue vitally important for healthy aging. Weight control and exercise can reduce these health risks.
Other tests in a medical checkup, such as a Pap smear and a PSA test, are focused on early detection of cancer.
All screening tests have their limitations: work-ups on positive findings may find no cancer eventually, whereas false negative results are always possible due to tumor heterogenicity or cutoff value problems. Nevertheless, they are valuable tools for early diagnosis.
With our 20+ year-experience in organizing health checks for Japanese expats in the Netherlands, we offer professional support in person-centered preventive healthcare.