Reproductive Health of Women in Rural Areas of East Azerbaijan – Iran, before and after Implementation of rural Family Physician Program: an Ecologic Study

Abstract

Introduction: Implementation of rural family physician program in Iran in 2005 has been evaluated and shown that this program has been led to some improvements in health indicators. In this study, some reproductive health (RH) indicators were compared before and after implementation of this program in rural areas of East Azerbaijan, Iran. Methods: In this ecologic- time trend study, the data of 191075 births of rural women of East Azerbaijan from 2001 to 2010 was extracted from vital horoscope (ZIJ) and used for calculation of 20 important RH indicators. The paired t-test and correlation analysis wear used for data analysis. Results: Some indicators such as adolescent marriage rate, adolescent birth and over 35 year olds birth rate were increased after rural family physician program implementation in 2005. Also stillbirth rate and unsafe delivery were decreased during this period. There was a significant correlation between increasing adolescent birth rate and increasing low birth weight deliveries (r= 0.911, P= 0.031) and also between increasing over 35 year olds birth rate and increasing neonatal mortality rate in term of prematurity and congenital malformations (r= 0.912, P= 0.031) after program implementation. Conclusion: Perinatal care and safe delivery even for pregnancies outside the typical child-bearing ages are promoting after implementation of rural family physician program in East Azerbaijan. Also decreasing unsafe delivery and stillbirth rate can be considered as achievements of running this program in this province.

Keywords: Reproductive health, Physicians, Family, Birth rate, Infant mortality, Perinatal care