Payesh
Year:2007 | Volume:6 | Issue:1|Papers Count:9

Objective (s): The purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence of HCV and high-risk behaviors in drug addiction inmates.Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional prevalence study of HCV infection in drug addiction inmates who were admitted to a prison in Guilan province, north of Iran, between September 2003 and October 2003. Subjects were asked questions regarding risk behaviors for HCV, and blood was drawn for HCV antibody testing using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA III) and positive samples rechecked.Results: Four hundred sixty inmates participated in this seroprevalence study. The mean age of respondents was 34.7±8.9 SD, (range from 18 to 65) years. Duration of addict was 9.6±8 SD years and 51.7% were opium addict, 18.3% heroin addict, 12.4% cannabis addict and others had addiction to more than one substance. The HCV risk behaviors were common in this population: intravenous drug use (18.6%), intranasal drug use (56.2%) and tattoos (56.1%). Two- hundred nine study subjects (45.4%) were HCV antibody positive that this rate was 88.9% among IV drug abusers. The HCV-positive status was significantly associated with history of intravenous drug use, having had tattoos, and previous in mating (P<0.05).Conclusion: Infection with hepatitis C is endemic in Iranian prisons. Better access to harm reduction strategies is needed in this environment and future studies should address the need for targeted HCV screening and education of prison inmates regarding risks for HCV.

Objective(s): Taking the importance of end-users' satisfaction in the overall success of a HIS, this study was performed to assess their attitudes in different hospitals in Tehran.Methods: Interviews were made with officials of 20 hospitals in Tehran. Research tool was a questionnaire in 8 parts. Results: Sixty three officials entered into the study. The average age was 40.7 years and 62.1% were male. 80.5% of the respondents indicated that they were satisfied or very satisfied with HIS in their hospitals. In general several factors found to be important to the HIS users. These were: better communication and quicker and more effective access to data, reports and outputs, organization management, resources, proper training for managers and users, compliance assessment inside the organization, ease of learning and implementation, effective support, and ease of use. Conclusion: The development of hospital information systems in Iran is in its early stages and despite their considerable progresses during recent years, they still require more investment in order to satisfy the administrators' and end users' expections.

Objective(s): Motorcyclists are responsible for a considerable part of road traffic accidents in Tehran. Recently, a specific project is planned by Tehran Traffic Police aimed on decreasing hazards attributable to motorcyclists. The main aim of this before-after study was to evaluate the effects of this project on the incidence and severity of road traffic accident injuries in Tehran.Methods: Each day constituted the study unit and data about injured patients referred to Sina hospital were collected in three different time periods. The data from May 8th2004 (the start of project) to June 7th 2004 were collected as the intervention period; and two periods were also studied: April 7th to May 7th 2004 (one month before starting the intervention), and May 8th to June 7th2003 (the similar period of the previous year). One thousand nine hundred and sixty five patients that were injured due to road traffic accident were entered into the study. The data were extracted from hospital records and after coding using the ICD 10 were analyzed.Results: Daily number of accident injuries increased in the intervention period (P=0.005), but the incidence of severe injuries (P<0.001) and also head and neck injuries (p=0.001) was decreased.Conclusion: The offender motorcyclists' penalty enforcement project was not successful in decreasing the incidence of traffic accident injuries, although it caused a shift to less severe injuries in Tehran.

Objective(s): This study was conducted to evaluate knowledge, attitude and practice of pedestrians about driving laws in Tehran.Methods: This was a cross sectional study. Convenient sampling used for selection of participants 58 points were defined using the map of Tehran. Almost three points were selected in each zone of municipality zones. Ten consecutive pedestrians passing the specified point were approached and interviewed by an interviewer. Chi square and Odds Ratio (OR) were used for the data analysis.Results: Five hundred and seventy eight pedestrian were recruited in this study. Knowledge, attitude and practice were seen in 66.7, 60.7 and 54.8 percent of respondents respectively. Using logistic regression analysis, there was a significant relation between knowledge and attitude. We did not observe any relation between attitudes and practice. There was a significant relation between knowledge and education and job, and also between knowledge and age, practice and education, job and sex.Conclusion: We conclude that practice of pedestrians in Tehran is weak regarding traffic laws and there is an urgent need for research and intervention in this regard.

Objective(s): To explain effective factors on rescue operation in Bam disaster management. Methods: This was an interview-based study. A sample of 415 individuals from Bam was entered into the study.Results: Barn rescue actions were based on international rescue standards. The findings showed that the success of the rescue functions in Barn was related to factors such as, human agencies, social order and safety, organizational integration and some infrastructures facilities.Conclusion: Organizational coordination, safety in the damaged origin, community participation and some infrastructures facilities like electricity, fuel and etc. were important factors that contributed to the high quality rescue operation in Iran.

Objective (s): In each society dealing with the HIV/AIDS problem requires a unique response considering the relative effect and magnitude of different risk factors on that society. Generalized Impact Fraction (GIF) is a measure that can be used for this purpose.Methods: Using a systematic review of reports on three risk factors for HIV/AIDS in Iran, namely poor knowledge and attitude, injecting drug use, and unsafe sexual practices; we tried to find the prevalence and effect size of each in the country. These findings were summarized and used as an input for calculating GIF, when considered as appropriate. Identified information gaps were considered as research priorities.Results: Ninety three reports were reviewed; among them 53 met the inclusion criteria and provided the necessary information on prevalence. The prevalence of poor knowledge was 29.3% in general population; GIF was 12% for injecting drug use outside prisons, and 16%- 75% for injecting drug use inside prisons. There was not sufficient information to calculate GIF for high-risk sexual behavior (sex work).Conclusion: Based on the systematic review, main research priorities for evidence-based decision making should help reaching a better understanding of the magnitude of injecting drug use and sex work in the country, incidence of HIV among these and other most-at-risk populations, and strengthen background evidence and cost-effectiveness of any preventive interventions, such as health communication and education programs and harm reduction measures.

Unconventional therapies include the interventions neither taught in medical schools nor generally available in hospitals. Many people use unconventional therapies for health problems and the frequency of using unconventional therapy is higher than previous. Some studies show that the cause of increasing the use of unconventional therapies (Complementary medicine) is due to deficiency and insufficiency of the conventional therapies which resulted in incomplete care.Statistics indicate that in Belgium 66%-75%, in Iran 42%, in US 34%, in UK 33%, in Germany 20-30% and in Netherlands 18% were using complementary medicine.Complementary medicine suffers from a poor research infrastructure and a lack of high quality evidence. Common reasons given for this were a lack of understanding of research ethics and methodology, an unwillingness to evaluate evidence, and a shortage of resources. Thus, considering the increase use of unconventional therapies, following steps are suggested for standardization of complementary medicine:-Situational analysis in the filed of complementary medicine- Recognition of unconventional practitioners- Information system Implementation- Implementation of research in complementary medicine-Resource allocation for a bow programsSuch approach might lead to innovations that could result in the accreditation of complementary therapeutic interventions.

Objective(s): The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence, of unwanted pregnancy and their correlates.Methods: This was a cross- sectional study. The sample in this study included 300 pregnant women admitted to hospital of Shahrood for delivery or abortion during March to April 2005. A self made questionnaire was used for data collection and completed through personal interview. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, Mann Whitney, X2 and logistic regression.Results: The overall prevalence of unwanted pregnancy was 31.3% (27.7 %urban and 36.2% rural). Of these 56.3% were real and 43.7% unreal unwanted. There were significant association between unwanted pregnancies and number, children, duration of marriage, mothers' age, early marriage, and fathers' age. Risks of unwanted pregnancy increased in persons who did not participate in the pre-marriage counseling and irregular visits to health center, during pregnancy.Conclusion: The results of this study indicate that there is need for more care on quality aspects of family planning services and specific attention on counseling and training programs.

Objective(s): The purpose of this study was to measure patients' satisfaction of medical care delivered in outpatient clinics of endocrinology and metabolism in Firoozgar teaching hospital Tehran, Iran.Methods: This was a cross-sectional study. One hundred and fifty-nine patients participated in the study. A self administered questionnaire was employed. The questions consisted of seven domains: general satisfaction, technical quality, interpersonal aspect, communication, financial aspect, time spent with doctor, access, availability and convenience.Results: The analysis showed that 69.8% of patients were female. The mean age of participants was 42.6 years and 17% have enjoyed secondary education. There was no significant statistical relation between age, sex, educational level and patients satisfaction, however a significant statistical relation observed between technical quality and sex (P=0.02) and access and age (p=0.03).Conclusion: Although the level of satisfaction of patients referring to outpatient clinics of endocrinology and metabolism was high but there was no significant statistical relationship between age, sex, educational level and patients satisfaction.