the trend of infertility in iran, an original review and meta-analysis

background & aim : worldwide prevalence of infertility has been reported to be 3-7% of all couples. there are varieties among the results of studies conducted on the prevalence of infertility in iran. the present study aimed to evaluate the trend of infertility using meta-analysis method in iran. methods & materials : we systematically reviewed all published papers in medline database of the national library of medicine and their persian equivalents (2001–2011). findings which met the inclusion criteria were included. random effects meta-analysis was applied to the data of 13 selected populations. data manipulation and statistical analyses were performed using stata. results : overall, 13 studies met our inclusion criteria. the pooled prevalence of infertility was 13.2% (95% ci: 8-18.3). the pooled prevalence of primary and secondary infertility were reported to be 5.2% (95% ci: 3.7 - 6.6) and 3.2% (95%ci: 2 - 4.4), respectively. the lowest and highest frequency of lifetime prevalence of infertility was 2.8% in 2001 and 24.9% in 2010, respectively. meta- regression scatter plot showed an increasing trend in the prevalence of infertility during 2001- 2011 (p = 0.58). meta-regression did not indicate a significant correlation between the sample sizes and the prevalence of infertility (p = 0.64). conclusion : the pooled infertility prevalence in iran is higher than its mean worldwide, and lifetime infertility is increasing in recent years compared to the past in iran.