Over 36.5m people screened for hypertension and diabetes

According to The Iran Project,Of the number of individuals screened, 703,676 people were identified with probable high blood pressure and 403,790 people with probable diabetes.

National health campaign

The first phase of the national health campaign started in November 2023 aiming to reduce deaths caused by non-communicable diseases.

The project with the theme of "earlier awareness, better care" will go on until January 20, ISNA reported.

The main objective of the campaign is to provide free health care for diabetic and hypertensive patients in the framework of the family physician program and to create an electronic health file for patients.

The identified patients will be checked every month or every three months by healthcare workers and doctors to receive free tests and medicines if needed.

Nowadays, health is one of the most essential human needs. Before the coronavirus pandemic, people may not have realized its importance, but this disease showed us how precious health is, Health Minister Bahram Einollahi said at a ceremony to unveil the Campaign.

“Maybe everyone thinks that our job is treatment, but it is not true. Our main duty is to prevent diseases and promote health.”

For this reason, a project called "national health campaign” started on November 11, 2023, and will continue till January 20.

Emphasizing the importance of improving health literacy, Einollahi said, “The level of literacy in the society has increased, and we expect this level to improve in the field of health as well. Also, we hope to manage having an electronic health file for every Iranian with their national identification code to record the history of illnesses in their family, their lifestyle, etc. so that their diseases and their reasons can be traced easily.”

He emphasized the campaign should include over 70 percent of the country's population; there is full preparation for its implementation in all universities of medical sciences, and everyone is mobilized to implement the plan.

Talking about the national health campaign, Einollahi said the campaign focuses on providing electronic health records for each family and screening them for diabetes and hypertension, and 70 percent of people are expected to participate in the campaign.

Einollahi added: “About 83 percent of all deaths registered in hospitals are caused by non-communicable diseases. Around 300,000 people die from cardiovascular diseases every year. Some 32 percent of people over 18 years old have hypertension, and 60 percent are unaware of their high blood pressure. Some 30,000 deaths per year occur due to diabetes in the country, which are all significant cases.”

By implementing the national health campaign, half a million deaths from non-communicable diseases and 30,000 deaths from diabetes can be prevented, he added.

“We hope to be able to prevent half a million deaths due to cardiovascular disease and 30 thousand deaths due to diabetes till 2030 with timely awareness,” he said.

More than 220,000 deaths, that is, about 89 percent of deaths per year, are caused by factors such as blood pressure, blood sugar, obesity, and overweight, he concluded.

Over the past 20 years, deaths caused by non-communicable diseases (NCDs) have risen by 14.5 percent. In 2016, 304,400 premature deaths were caused by NCDs in Iran, according to WHO.

Some 0.5 percent of premature deaths happen before the age of 70 and 2 percent before the age of 50.

Einollahi went on to say that in the future, each individual with a national ID code, will have a health file. In 93 cities, health information is collected by healthcare providers.

NCDs account for 83% of mortalities

A large number of deaths in the country are caused by cardiovascular diseases. That's why high blood pressure and diabetes, as risk factors, have been prioritized by the NCD Office and the Ministry of Health, IRNA quoted Farzaneh Farbakhsh as saying.

Non-communicable diseases such as diabetes and high blood pressure can be easily controlled in the early stages even without taking medication, she added.

The national health campaign, which kicked off in November 2023, seeks to improve the health of the population group aged over 18 by extensive screening.

It aims at detecting diseases and informing the target group about these illnesses and their risks.

“The main objective of this campaign is to detect diseases in the early stages to provide more effective care for our countrymen,” Farbakhsh said.

Universities of Medical Sciences will help in different ways to inform the target population, those over 18, and pregnant mothers in all age groups, about health risk factors i.e. diabetes and high blood pressure.

The Health Ministry is looking for better implementation of the national health campaign by actively using the media, billboards, placards, and posters to communicate information and raise people’s awareness, she noted.

The campaign tries to provide detailed information and educational content that will help the target groups learn about diseases they may not be aware of. Then, they will try to change their lifestyle to promote their health.

“By making coordination between governmental departments, private sector organizations, and health centers, our colleagues can undertake diabetes and high blood pressure screening as visiting workforces in labor departments, factories, and industrial estates,” Farbakhsh said.

The individuals identified in the screening won’t be abandoned after the end of the national health campaign; they will be subject to periodic control and receive the necessary care if needed, she added.

Health promotion program

Around 400,000 health volunteers are active in the country, acting as the link between the health system and different strata of the society, ISNA quoted Farshidi as saying on December 5, 2023.

Referring to the ‘comprehensive system of social participation’ which was introduced this summer, he said the promotion of health mainly highlights the rights of citizens and social justice.

By people-oriented participatory plans, it is tried to prevent the dominance of a certain group with local influence or the exclusion of some classes from services and facilities.

Health promotion programs aim to engage individuals and communities and promote a healthy lifestyle, prevention, and timely response.

It is a three-pronged plan. The first part involves ‘individual and family’, which refers to individual and family self-care and management. More than three million family ambassadors are active in this field.

The second part is the ‘neighborhood’ that promotes the health and the participation of 400,000 health volunteers.

The third part refers to the workplace and organization that practices a self-care approach at work.

In September 2022, Einollahi said that Iran has one of the strongest health systems in the region and that this opportunity should be used optimally in the field of health diplomacy.

Based on innovative indicators of health technology development in 2021, Iran was ranked 60th among 132 countries, which shows an improvement of 60 steps compared to 2014, Younes Panahi, the deputy health minister for research and technology, has announced.

Reporter : Editorial of The Iran Project