| Health equity has become a progressively popular research topic in recent years. Therefore, this
study was made to identify the contributions made by socioeconomic determinants in order to
quantify their roles to healthcare utilization inequity and to show their status especially after the
recent reform in Iran, i.e. Health Transformation Plan, which one of its main goals is providing
access to healthcare for all people. This study is a cross-sectional study conducted on a national
level in Iran in 2015. For the sampling frame, three-stage cluster sampling was used. A total of
22 470 households from the whole country were surveyed by questionnaires through face-to-face
interviews. A total of 78 378 subjects responded to the survey, 18 984 subjects (24.2%) reported the
need to outpatient healthcare services in the 2 weeks preceding the interview and 12 944 (68.2%) of
them had utilized the outpatient services. In addition, 5928 participants (7.6% of total population)
reported the need to inpatient healthcare in the 15-month interval prior to the interview. Of these,
5405 subjects (91.2%) had received the inpatient cares. Several factors such as age group, education, marital status and status of household economy play significant roles in seeking inpatient
cares. In addition, age group and household economic status have significant impacts on the
utilization of outpatient services. While there are several variables that have different effects in
determining the need for both outpatient and inpatient services, most of them are not any more
significant than what are on the receiving end of these services. |