Ranking West Azerbaijan districts regarding utilization of structural indices of health care

  Background: The requirement of regional planning is identification of developmental position of districts . One of the main and basic indicators of development is health and extent of people's utilization of health care services and facilities.   Objective: The aim of this study was to rank West Azerbaijan districts regarding utilization of structural indices of health care.   Methods: This analytical study was performed at West Azerbaijan districts in 2011. Data related to the indices (institutional, human resources and rural health) were collected from the province's statistical yearbook in 2008 and the population data of the districts were collected from documents of Iran's Statistics Center. Data were analyzed by Scalogram model and Excel software and maps were drawn by ArcGIS software.   Findings : Mahabad district with 97 scores and Piranshahr district with 39 scores had highest and lowest extent of utilization of structural indices of health care, respectively. Totally, 42% of the districts were located in less developed and underdeveloped levels and only 21% of the districts were located in developed level. Among the structural indices of health care, the most development was related to the rural health indices and the lowest development was related to the institutional and human resources indices.   Conclusion: There was a great difference among the districts of West Azerbaijan province in terms of utilization of structural indices of health care. It is suggested that the development-based planning should be implemented according to the development levels of these districts.