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

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

Methods: 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.

Results: 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%).

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