National health information systems in Iran

Objective (s): 

The purpose of this study was to review the content of the national health information systems in Iran. The practical purpose was to provide the necessary information to increase the efficiency of national health information systems in order to improve health services.

This was a mixed method study (review and qualitative). First, documents related to the health information system (especially on the website of the Ministry of Health and its affiliated organizations) were reviewed. Search strategy included the following keywords: Health system, Health system in transition, Health information system, Health information system in transition, Health information. At this stage the study was seeking to collect data for following questions: Who is running the site? What are the variables that each system registers and maintains? What are the information recording processes? What outputs and reports are extracted? Who are the users of this information? Then, a qualitative study was conducted and seven experts were interviewed. All systems were checked for the following information such as mission, aims, client, moderator, variables, registration process, output, beneficiaries and target groups.

In all there were 10 national health information systems, and more than 150 specific registries for disease conditions. In addition, we found 11 different names for Electronic Health Record (EHR).

In general, health-related databases (healthcare and insurance databases) have not yet been fully integrated, and it is not possible to detect drug disorders or violations in addition to duplicate or more recording of information. Also, there was no codified program found to analyze the data in the databases studied.