In short
A longevity consultation is one appointment that produces three things: a calculated cardiovascular risk, a short list of tests that are actually justified, and two or three changes with numbers attached.
Every test proposed has to clear the same three questions before it is ordered.
- Does this condition cause real harm, often enough in someone like you?
- Would finding it early lead to a better outcome than finding it later?
- Is the test good enough not to cause more trouble than it prevents?
In Dubai that matters more than the age thresholds suggest, because cardiometabolic risk here appears earlier than in the populations most guidelines were written for.
Treatment Overview
What happens in the appointment?
Roughly half of it is history. What you do, how you sleep, how much you sit, what you drink, what your family has had and at what age, and what you are actually worried about.
That history determines which tests are worth doing. Ordering the panel first and interpreting it afterwards is the wrong way round, because for most conditions in most people the yearly incidence is low.
Is a longevity consultation available in Dubai? Yes. This one runs at Dubai Healthcare City. What is specific to patients here.
Why is the test list short?
Because unnecessary tests are not neutral. In a group without symptoms most conditions are rare, so a large share of positive results from a weak test will be false, and each false positive leads to further testing with its own risks.
The bar a test has to clear is the one at the top of this page: burden of suffering, a treatment that works better early than late, and a test that performs well enough to be worth the false alarms. The US Preventive Services Task Force grades its recommendations on the same logic, and its grade D means the harms outweigh the benefits.
People also misjudge the trade. A 2015 systematic review of 35 studies found that patients more often overestimated the benefit of a treatment, screen or test than underestimated it, and more often underestimated the harm. A companion review in 2017 found clinicians do the same. That is why the reasoning here is made explicit rather than assumed.
What is normally included?
The starting set is small and the same for most people: enough to calculate a cardiovascular risk properly, plus whatever screening has evidence at your age.
| Element | What it involves |
|---|---|
| Cardiovascular risk | Blood pressure, a full lipid panel, glucose or HbA1c, kidney function and weight, run through a validated calculator |
| Lifetime risk | Added between 30 and 59 when the 10 year figure is low or borderline, because a low 10 year risk can sit alongside a high 30 year one |
| Age appropriate screening | Only the tests with evidence for someone your age and sex, from the current recommendation list |
| Symptom directed tests | Where you have an actual symptom, which is investigated as a symptom rather than folded into a screening package |
The calculator used here is the American Heart Association PREVENT model, which gives both a 10 year and a 30 year figure from age 30. Why the choice of calculator changes the number.
What is deliberately not included?
- Whole body scans, which mostly find things that were never going to matter
- Biological age tests, which are not standardised and do not change what should be done
- Broad hormone or micronutrient screens ordered without a question attached
- Repeat calcium scoring to check whether treatment is working, which does not add useful information
Growth hormone, compounded hormone mixtures, most supplements, intravenous infusions and biological age tests are not offered, because the evidence does not support them. What has evidence and what does not.
A whole body scan mostly finds things that were never going to matter, and each finding leads to further testing. What full body scans actually produce.
How is the plan decided?
By risk band. Your calculated 10 year risk puts you in one of four groups, and each group has a defined answer, from lifestyle only below 3 percent to treatment without further stratification at 10 percent or more.
The calculated 10 year risk puts you in one of four bands, and each band has a defined answer, from lifestyle only below 3 percent to treatment without further testing at 10 percent or more. What each band means.
Where the decision is genuinely uncertain, usually at borderline or intermediate risk, a coronary calcium score often settles it in one direction or the other. When a calcium score is worth doing.
Longevity consultations in Dubai and the UAE
Does a visa medical or a company health check already cover this?
No. A UAE residency medical screens for communicable disease, not for your cardiovascular risk, and a corporate health package is a fixed list of tests rather than a decision about which tests you need.
Neither produces a calculated risk, and neither tells you which of the results actually changes anything. That calculation is the point of this appointment. What a corporate health check does and does not do.
Why does risk get calculated earlier here?
Because the local numbers do not wait for the usual age thresholds. In the UAE Healthy Future Study, among 5,167 adults aged 18 to 40, 62.7 percent already had dyslipidaemia, 26.5 percent obesity and 22.4 percent raised blood pressure.
Cardiometabolic risk appears earlier here than the standard age thresholds assume, and heart attacks in Dubai are treated in men at an average age of 42. The UAE numbers.
Which tests come up most often in Dubai?
Glucose or HbA1c, a lipid panel and blood pressure done properly, because those three carry most of the decision here. The national survey of the Ministry of Health and Prevention found raised blood glucose in 12.5 percent of adults, raised blood pressure in 25.9 percent and insufficient physical activity in 59.1 percent.
Vitamin D is a common request. It is tested when there is a reason to, not as routine. Why vitamin D and bone health come up here.
Who Is a Good Candidate?
- You are 30 or older and have never had your cardiovascular risk formally calculated
- You have been offered a health package and want to know which parts of it are actually worth doing
- There is early heart disease, diabetes or cancer in your family
- You want a plan you can act on rather than a folder of results
- Previous results were flagged as borderline and nobody explained what to do about them
- An active symptom, which needs a diagnostic appointment rather than a preventive one
- Chest pain or breathlessness on exertion, which needs assessing now
- You are looking for growth hormone, unlicensed peptides or infusion based anti ageing treatment, which are not offered
What Happens During the Consultation
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1
History, in detail
Activity, sitting time, sleep, alcohol, smoking, diet, medication, and a family history with ages attached. This narrows what is worth testing before anything is ordered.
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2
Examination and baseline measures
Blood pressure taken properly, weight, and a focused examination. Blood pressure is confirmed outside the clinic before any diagnosis of hypertension is made.
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3
A justified test list
Each test named, with the reason it is being done and what an abnormal result would lead to. Tests that would not change anything are named and left out.
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4
Results, decisions and an interval
Your risk band, two or three specific changes with numbers attached, and a date for the next review: three to five years for cardiovascular risk if low, yearly if not.
Program Structure & Follow-Up
What happens after the first appointment?
You get the results with an interpretation, not a portal link. Each abnormal or borderline value comes with what it means and whether it needs anything done.
How often you are seen after that
The interval follows your age and what was found, not a subscription.
| Situation | Interval |
|---|---|
| Under 50, no chronic conditions | About every three years |
| 50 and over | Yearly |
| Any chronic condition | Regular review regardless of age |
| Cardiovascular risk | Every three to five years from 20, or yearly at borderline risk and above |
| On new medication | Sooner, for monitoring and dose adjustment |
Is more frequent better?
No. In a Cochrane review of 17 randomised trials, general health checks did not reduce death from any cause, from cardiovascular disease or from cancer (Krogsboll et al., 2019). Shorter intervals mostly generate more borderline results.
What if something needs following up?
It is followed up specifically, with a named test and a date, rather than being rolled into the next annual package.
Benefits, Limits & Safety
What does the consultation actually deliver?
A number you did not have, a decision on treatment that is based on it, and a short list of changes rather than a general instruction to be healthier.
It also delivers a list of things you do not need, which is often the more valuable half.
What are its limits?
A consultation cannot make you low risk. It tells you where you stand and what moves the number, and most of the moving is done by you between appointments.
The same Cochrane review found that general health checks did improve the detection of high blood pressure and high cholesterol, but improved detection on its own did not translate into fewer deaths. The benefit comes from acting on the findings.
How are risks communicated?
In absolute terms. Being told that a treatment cuts your risk by half means little without knowing half of what, and absolute numbers are the form people read most accurately.
Where the decision is genuinely balanced, you are told that it is balanced rather than being pushed one way.
What is refused
- Growth hormone, unlicensed peptides and intravenous anti ageing infusions
- Compounded hormone mixtures
- Whole body imaging as a routine screen
- Screening you are unlikely to benefit from, which is more common than most people realise
The Emirates Drug Establishment acted against 71 sources selling unapproved peptide products in July 2026. Medicines here come from licensed pharmacies only.
What you leave with
A calculated risk band, a justified test list, results explained in absolute terms, and two or three changes with numbers attached.
How often
Every three years under 50, yearly from 50, cardiovascular risk every three to five years from 20 and yearly at borderline risk or above.
Not offered
Growth hormone, unlicensed peptides, anti ageing infusions, routine whole body scans and biological age testing.
Cost & Program Investment
The consultation is quoted individually and each test is quoted before it is ordered, so you know the total before anything happens. There is no fixed package and no tiers, because the right set of tests depends on your age and risk rather than on a price point. If a test would not change anything for you, you will be told so rather than sold it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Long enough for the history to be taken properly, because the history is what determines which tests are worth doing. Ordering a panel first and interpreting it afterwards is the wrong sequence.
It depends which tests are ordered, and you will be told in advance. A coronary calcium score, if one is indicated, needs no fasting, no contrast and no medication.
You can ask, but you will be talked through why the tests that do not apply to you are more likely to cause trouble than to help. In a person without symptoms and at low risk, most positive results from a weak test are false, and each one leads to further testing.
Only if your calculated risk band supports it. Below 3 percent usually not, between 5 and 10 percent usually yes, and in between it depends on risk enhancers, on your 30 year risk and sometimes on a coronary calcium score.
Then it becomes a diagnostic appointment rather than a preventive one. Symptoms are investigated on their own terms instead of being absorbed into a screening plan. Chest pain or breathlessness on exertion needs assessing now, not at a scheduled review.
No, and not on request. Neither has an evidence base for anti ageing use in healthy adults, and both carry real risks. The trial data behind that refusal are set out on the anti ageing page.
That is a real result and it is used. It sets the interval for the next review and moves the focus to the modifiable factors, which is where almost all of the available benefit is.
No. A residency medical screens for communicable disease. A corporate package is a fixed test list. Neither produces a calculated cardiovascular risk, and neither tells you which findings should change what you do.
Evidence
Where this information comes from
Every figure on this page is taken from the sources below. All of them are free to read, so you can check them yourself.
- Grade definitions for preventive services
- Patients' expectations of the benefits and harms of treatments, screening, and tests: a systematic review
- Clinicians' expectations of the benefits and harms of treatments, screening, and tests: a systematic review
- General health checks in adults for reducing morbidity and mortality from disease
- PREVENT online calculator for cardiovascular risk
- High prevalence of cardiometabolic risk factors amongst young adults in the United Arab Emirates: the UAE Healthy Future Study
- MoHAP releases National Health and Nutrition Survey 2024-2025
- Systematic review: the safety and efficacy of growth hormone in the healthy elderly
- UAE cracks down on unapproved peptide products
This page is general medical information and does not replace a personal consultation. Trial results are averages across large groups, not a prediction for any one person.