| Objectives The establishment of the Family Physician (FP)
programme in the rural areas of Iran in 2005 has made
health services accessible and affordable. This paper aims to
assess the overall trends of maternal and child health (MCH)
indicators in a 20-year period and possible effects of the FP
programme (intervention) on these indicators in Iran.
Design and setting An interrupted time series analysis was
conducted on 20 annual MCH-related data points from 1994
to 2013. The intervention time was at the 12th data point in
2005.
Outcomes MCH indicators were grouped into three
categories: structure (mother’s age, education, occupation
and gravidity), process (number of antenatal care visits (ACVs),
laboratory tests, ultrasounds and natural vaginal deliveries
(NVDs)) and outcomes (maternal mortality ratio (MMR),
neonatal mortality rate (NMR), birth weight (BW), history of
abortion and/or stillbirth, and haemoglobin level (Hb)).
Results The adjusted slope of the ACV trend decreased
sharply after the intervention (b=−0.36, p<0.01), whereas it
increased for the frequency of ultrasounds (b=0.2, p<0.01)
and did not change for number of laboratory tests (b=−0.09,
p=0.95). The intensification of the descending slope observed
for NVD (b=−1.91, p=0.03) disappeared after the adjustment
for structural confounders (b=1.33, p=0.26). There was no
significant slope change for MMR (b=1.12, p=0.28) and
NMR (b=0.67, p=0.07) after the intervention. The slope for
the history of abortion trend was constant before and after
the intervention, but it considerably intensified for the history
of stillbirths after the intervention (b=1.72, p<0.01). The
decreasing trend of BW turned into a constant mode after the
intervention (b=33.2, p<0.01), but no change was observed
for Hb (b=−0.02, p=0.78).
Conclusion Although the FP programme had a positive
effect on the process and proximal outcome indicators (BW),
no dramatic effect on mortality outcome indicators was
distinguished. It shows that there should be determinants or
mediators of mortality outcomes in this setting, other than
accessibility and affordability of MCH services |