Evaluation of the urban family physician plan in Iran using the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) model

Articles in Press

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Shiraz University of Medical science

2 Department of Public Administration, Sirjan Branch, Islamic Azad University of Sirjan, Iran

10.30476/jhmi.2026.108221.1307

Abstract

Introduction and Objective: The Urban Family Physician plan was established based on primary health care in two provinces of Fars and Mazandaran (Iran). There is insufficient information on the program's effectiveness. This study aims to evaluate the performance of the urban family physician plan using the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) model.
Methods: In a cross-sectional study, physicians and health service providers (n=233) and their clients (n=199) of urban family physicians were selected through multi-stage sampling from Shiraz, Iran. The data were collected using a researcher-made questionnaire based on the EFQM model. Its content and face validity were confirmed by expert panels, and reliability was calculated by Cronbach's alpha. Data analysis was performed using descriptive and one-sample and MANOVA test in SPSS version 25 software. In all tests, a two-sided significance level of 5% was considered.
Findings: The results showed that there was no statistically significant difference between the physicians and health service providers, except staff dimension (p=0.023).On the other hand, the dimensions related to service recipients between women and men were tested using multivariate analysis of variance. Based on these results, no statistically significant difference was observed between women and men (P>0.05).
Conclusion: Based on the evaluation, the overall performance of the scheme in key dimensions, especially staff and leadership, is below the expected standards. These results indicate that there is a pressing need to improve human resource management, upgrade skills and motivate staff.

Keywords

Main Subjects

Health Management & Information Science

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 01 April 2026

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