Prevalence of illegal drug abuse in iran, meta-analysis, and identification of its contextual risk factor amongst graguates in tabriz

Abstract

Background: There are numerous empirical studies on the prevalence of illicit drug abuse in Iran however; heterogeneity of the methods used and the reported prevalence rates make comparison of the single point estimates imprecise. To provide evidence based estimates of the drug use in Iran, this study was conducted to critically appraise the study reports and give aggregate estimates of different drug use in Iran. Methods: Several databases including Pub med, Sid, Irandoc, Magiran, Medlib, Iiranmedex, Iranpsych and Sciencedirect were searched using Mesh terms and their Persian equivalents to find relevant published articles from - . Authors independently critically appraised the retrieved publications and had the inclusion criteria. Prevalence rates and their confidence intervals were used to estimate pooled prevalence rates based on the random effect model using Comprehensive Meta Analysis (CMA) software. Finding: Self reported alcoholic beverage use was % ( CI: - ), opium ( CI: - ) and cigarette smoking ( CI: - ) among teenagers. Medical university students also reported to use cigarette ( , CI: - ) and hookah ( , CI: - ) in a lower level than the non-medical university students (cigarette use was , CI: - ). Cigarette smoking was prevalent among ( CI: - ) of general population. Conclusion: Inconsistencyin the methods and reporting protocol of conducted studies was paramount amongst the Iranian studies on drug abuse. Due to socio-cultural and legal considerations in the country context, self reported prevalence rate of drug abuse may also cause bias. Application of evidence based research methodology is recommended in future investigations to target drug abuse in Iran.