Satisfaction Rate of Service Recipients and Providers of Rural Family Physician Program in Iran: A systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Background and Measuring the satisfaction of service recipients and service providers is one of the main key indices for evaluation of rural family physician program. So far, 10 years has passed since this program was implemented and different results have been published. In this study we aimed to estimate the overall level of both service recipients and service providers’ satisfaction using meta-analysis. National and international databases were reviewed and articles published in March 2005 to April 2015 were identified. We also investigated the study references and interviewed some researchers to enhance the search sensitivity. Eligible papers for final meta-analysis were selected after quality assessment and application of inclusion/exclusion criteria. There was a significant heterogeneity between the results of the studies, therefore, random effects model was applied to estimate the total level of stakeholder satisfaction using Stata SE. V.11. This meta-analysis included 18 relevant studies investigating the satisfaction level of 8009 service recipients and 921 service providers. Total levels of satisfaction among service recipients and service providers regarding the rural family physician program were estimated to be 54.03% (40.6- 67.4) and 50.4% (27.8-73.03), respectively. The current study showed a moderate level of satisfaction regarding the rural family physician program among stakeholders.