Methodologies and Messages in Iranian Articles on Maternal Care, Diabetes Mellitus, and Tuberculosis, Published in 2001 - 2006

Introduction: an article with a clear message can transfer researchknowledge better. however, this is the case when the message suitsthe type of study methodology (research design) and its results.the objective of this study was to assess the presence of messagearticles and the type of study methodologies.methods: articles published between 2001 and 2006, onmaternal care, diabetes, and tuberculosis, which were based onstudies performed on the iranian population were investigated. asystematic search was performed in foreign databases ‘pubmed,medline, and embase’, and national databases ‘iranmedex, sid(scientific information database), and iranpsych’. seven hundredand ninety?five articles were examined for the type of studymethodology and presence of an actionable message (one thatspecifies what and how an action should be carried out).results: among the 795 articles accessed, cross?sectional studieswere the most frequent (50.9%) and systematic reviews were theleast frequent (0.4%). cohort cases were observed in 6.9% of thecases. actionable messages were observed in 22.1% of all the casesand 24.7% of the cross?sectional studies.conclusions: cohort studies increased from 5% in 2001 to 6.9%in 2006, but the shortage of systematic reviews represented a majorweakness in the country’s knowledge production process. studieswith a higher level of evidence such as systematic reviews, andcohort and interventional studies should be among the prioritiesof knowledge production in the country.