TEHRAN –With a forty percent coverage of the target population in urban areas, the Family Physician Program has included 182 cities in the country so far, an official with the Ministry of Health has announced.

“The program has been implemented in 182 cities of the country covering more than 20 million Iranians,” IRNA quoted Mohsen Barouni as saying.

A total of 20,263,501 persons have been covered by the Family Physician Program, which constitutes 40 percent of the target population in cities.

Over 4300 healthcare workers have been recruited for the implementation of the program. So far, Family Physician Program has been implemented in three phases; in the first phase 59 cities were included in the program; in the second phase, it raised to 93 cities and now a total of 182 cities are covered by the program.

Barouni went on to say that the Family Physician Program has not yet been carried out in 66 cities of the country, they will join the program in the next stages.

According to Health Minister Bahram Einollahi, the purpose of implementing the Family Physician Program is to prioritize prevention over treatment in the country.

Family Physician Program

In November, Hossein Farshidi, an official with the health ministry said the Family Physician Program will be launched in other cities with a total population of 28 million as of late April next year.

Observing the results of the survey carried out by the national health campaign, which monitors high blood pressure and diabetes, the success of the program can be measured as 100 percent of the population of these 93 cities will be screened in the campaign, he noted.

So far, the Family Physician Program has made treatment referrals more concentrated and improved the interactions between doctors and healthcare providers.

On September 8, Einollahi described the Family Physician Program as the most important priority of the ministry for the next two years.

"This program is a basic measure which, in case of being properly formed, will solve many problems of the health system,” Einollahi said, IRNA reported.

He continued: “It is necessary to explain the results of this program in the international arena for the World Health Organization and its Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office.”

Einollahi referred to saving family expenses by reducing the costs of treatment and promoting the correct pattern of drug consumption as some of the most important goals to be achieved by the program.

Conducting health research programs under the Family Physician Program will be able to clarify why certain diseases, namely cancer, or why specific environmental health problems are more common in one region of the country than others, the minister explained.

By implementing Family Physician Program, national decision-makers, and medical authorities will be provided with the information needed for effective health management, he pointed out.

“Therefore, in the next two years, we must take steps toward the implementation of the Family Physician Program.”

Family Physician Program was started in 2005, which targeted almost 25,000,000 citizens residing in rural areas, and was piloted in two provinces of Fars and Mazandaran.

Periodic examinations and monitoring of people's health status, easy and round-the-clock access to basic services and primary care, and frequent visits to doctors are the characteristics of a family physician.

Based on the Family Physician Program, a physician and a midwife offer services in rural areas, every 3,300 villagers have a physician and there is a midwife per 5,200 people in villages.

The implementation of the Family Physician Program in urban areas began in June 2012 in Fars and Mazandaran provinces. Reducing out-of-pocket payments has been an important effect and benefit of the urban family physician program.

MT/MG