A Foresight Study of the Health System at the National Level in Iran: A Systematic Review

Context: Health systems’ main mission is to improve society’s well-being and fulfill their health needs. Objectives: This study aimed to describe the intrinsic and extrinsic events that had influenced Iran’s health system over the previous decade, as well as to identify the possible factors influencing it until 2025 and investigate their positive/negative impacts. Methods: To determine previous driving forces, a systematic review of electronic databases was conducted up to December 2018. Then the most frequent contributing factors were extracted and discussed in expert panels, and finally, scenarios were composed. After identifying the internal and external driving forces as well as their effects, an input-output model was designed by using a sequence of events’ scenarios. Finally, findings were presented using a scenario-based expert system model. Results: The most important driving forces affecting health system’s policies included “demographic changes”, “economic changes”, “natural disasters”, “changes in population’s health status”, and “changes in the health system’s management.” Furthermore, other events such as “risks associated with emerging technologies”, “cold wars”, and “changes in personal vehicle utilization rates” may have, directly or indirectly, affected the benefits from health services, status, costs, and out-of-pocket payments. Conclusions: In sum, it was found possible to implement the most effective crisis management system, eliminate the negative effects of these uncertainties, and reap the most considerable benefits by identifying the factors influencing health system, determining their interrelationships and effects, as well as designing separate scenarios for all possible outcomes.