a comparative study on the degree of development of the health and health service sector in iranian provinces in 2008

normal 0 false false false en-us x-none ar-sa microsoftinternetexplorer4 background: one of the major steps for planning and making polices in iranian health and health service sector is to gain information on the condition of such services in each province. thus, the present study intended to determine the degree of development and ranking of provinces at this sector. it can identify the undeveloped provinces for better planning.   methods: this study applied a library and documentary method for collecting the data which had been provided by the iranian statistical center and its related journals. the study population included the health sector at thirty provinces in 2008. using methods such as analysis of main components and numerical taxonomy as well as considering seventeen indexes of health and having access to health services, this study dealt with the ranking provinces.   findings: homogeneity gap was determined through estimation in numerical taxonomy method, based on which north khorasan, south khorasan and hormozgan provinces did not fall within the homogeneity gap; therefore, they were excluded from the sum, and ranking was conducted for the remaining twenty-seven homogenous provinces.   conclusion: considering the degree of development of the provinces, it was revealed that ilam, chaharmahal-bakhtiari, isfahan, yazd, mazandaran, semnan and guilan had the best condition as compared with other provinces. however, sistan-baluchistan, qom, west azerbaijan, kohkilouyeh-boyerahmad, tehran, and kerman had an inappropriate condition. in the same year, ilam and sistan-baluchistan were the most developed and the most undeveloped provinces in the health sector, respectively.