Establishment of Research Priorities of Emergency Units of Teaching Hospitals Affiliated to Zanjan University of Medical Sciences: A Delphi Study

The establishment of priorities has a significant role in the management of healthcare-related researches in countries. This importance doubles when financial and human resources are limited. This study aimed to sort out research priorities of the emergency units of teaching hospitals affiliated to Zanjan University of Medical Sciences in 2015.
Materials and Methods This study used the three-round Delphi survey. Using purposive sampling, 44 subjects comprising the director of emergency departments, faculty members of the emergency medical and nursing departments, director of the emergency units, head nurses of the emergency units, educational supervisors of the hospitals, and physicians, nurses, and midwives with at least 1year experience in emergency units were selected. Qualitative Data was analyzed by content analysis and quantitative data by descriptive statistics using SPSS Ver. 22 software.
Qualitative and quantitative data analysis resulted in 51 research priorities which categorized into three areas, namely educational area with 16 topics, management area with 26 topics, and clinical area with 9 topics.
The prioritized research topics can be used as a suitable guide for stakeholders in selecting research topics and steering their research activities. Also, the prioritized research topics let the directed allocation of research resources and budgets.