Gestational diabetes and its relationship with social determinants of health according to World Health Organization Model: Systematic Review

Gestational diabetes is a growing health problem around the world and is one of the most common complications of pregnancy which have many negative impacts on mother and fetus. This study was performed with aim to investigate the articles which have been published on gestational diabetes and the relationship of gestational diabetes with social determinants of health in Iran.
In this systematic review, the published articles in databases such as Iranmedex, Magiran, SID, Irandoc, Pubmed and Google Scholar were searched. Comprehensive search was done with the keywords of Gestational Diabetes, Risk factors, structural determinants, Intermediary determinants, Prevalence, Iran for Persian articles and their English equivalents for English article. After completion of searching and evaluation of the articles by a checklist, 42 articles which were performed from 2000 to 2015 in Iran were enrolled in study.
Among 42 assessed articles, 14 articles reported GDM related factors, 8 articles reported GDM related factors and prevalence of GDM and 20 articles only reported the prevalence of gestational diabetes. The prevalence of GDM has been reported between 1.25 to 29.9%. GDM related factors in the articles included structural determinants (education, occupation, income, social class and ethnicity), intermediate determinants (stress, social support, violence, food insecurity and incorrect health behaviors) and health cares.
Gestational diabetes is a common problem which is associated with several factors of social determinants of health. Therefore, adopting appropriate interventions in many cases including training, self-care and increasing pregnancy care seems to be necessary to reduce theses consequences and their following complications in high risk people.