Those who have foreign qualifications and wish to have them assessed must send personal information, certificates and other documentation to the Swedish Work Environment Authority via email.

What are medical check-ups?

By medical check-up is meant a medical measure that is intended to be of support in work environment management. This can encompass biological exposure check-ups, examination by a doctor, health examinations, and fitness for duty assessments.

Those with competence to carry out medical examinations with fitness for duty assessments are:

• licensed medical practitioners with special competence in occupational medicine,  occupational and environmental medicine, or the equivalent
• licensed medical practitioners with specialist competence within occupational health care
• licensed medical practitioner who has passed the National Institute for Working Life occupational physician or equivalent training, and who has at least the equivalent of two years of full time service within civil occupational health care or the corresponding service within the military forces. It is the employer offering medical check-ups who is responsible for the doctor having the correct competence.

Those who wish to work as specialist doctors in Sweden must have a Swedish medical licence, and Swedish proof of specialist competence. The professional title is protected. This means that only someone who has proof of special competence may call themselves a specialist in their specialist area. In Sweden, the National Board of Health and Welfare is responsible for this assessment of the doctor’s qualifications. You can apply by paying a fee, filling in an application form and sending it, together with the required documents, to the National Board of Health and Welfare.

This means that the question about whether a foreign doctor’s competence corresponds to the Swedish specialties of occupational and work environment medicine or occupational medicine will, even in the future, be assessed by the National Board of Health and Welfare. That which we can assess are the applicants who maintain that they have experience and competence equivalent to ’licensed medical practitioner who, with a pass result, has undergone the National Institute for Working Life occupational physician training or equivalent training, and who has at least the equivalent of two years of service within civil occupational healthcare or the corresponding service within the military forces’. 

The Swedish Work Environment Authority can only assess your qualifications if you obtained them

• in the EU/EEA
• in another country, but you have had them approved in another EU/EEA country.