Perceived challenges of the Schools Iron Aid National Plan from stakeholder perspectives

Iron deficiency in the body is the main cause of anemia, and iron supplementation is probably the best option for iron deficiency and iron deficiency anemia in women and young children. This study aimed to explain the challenges of national iron supplementation in female school’s base on the perspective of the stakeholders. This study was a qualitative study of content analysis. The data of this study were conducted by focus group discussion, semi-deep interviews with the participation of the target community of students, parents of students, school principals and school health instructors, general manager of the Office of Community Nutrition (Department of Education) includes manager, deputy and school health officer, from October 2016 to January 2017 in city of Gonabad, Iran. Participants were selected through targeted sampling and data collection continued to saturation. Data were analyzed using contractual content analysis method based on five steps of Graneheim and Lundman. Data management was done with NVivo software, version 11 (QSR International, Victoria, Australia), but data analysis and interpretation were done manually. The findings from group discussions and semi-deep interviews with stakeholders were categorized into twelve themes. The main strength, perceived in "Perceived Individual Benefits" and "Perceived Executive or Management Benefits". The main perceived weakness was "Physical Disadvantages", "Tablets Disadvantages", "Disadvantages of Programming" and "Disadvantages of the Program". The main perceived barriers was "Educational and Information Barriers", "Barriers of Pill Consumption" and "Management and Administrative Barriers". "Modifying the Executive Program", "Individual Perception Modification" and "Reform the Shape of Pills" were suggested as a corrective mechanism from participants’ view point. According to the results of this study, the most important challenges of the "Schools Iron Aid National Plan" were "Educational and Information Barriers", "Administrative barriers", and "Barriers to Pill Consumption". Therefore, in order to do better, the Iron Supplementation Program requires intervention at individual, interpersonal, inter-organizational, and intra-organizational levels to provide comprehensive support for the program and, ultimately, increase program productivity.