Journal of

Background and Aim:  Hospital as an economic entity, should utilize economic analysis for the optimal use of resources and production facilities. The aim of this study was to estimate the production function of Ahvaz University of Medical Sciences during the period 2006-2014.
Materials and Methods: This study was a descriptive cross-sectional analysis. The Data were collected during a period of 9 years in 7 hospitals in Ahvaz. The dependent variable in this study was the number of hospital admissions as the production level and the explanatory variables, including nurses, physicians, staffs, and the number of beds. To determine and specify the form of subordinated Cobb - Douglas production function was used. Data analysis and econometric model was estimated using STATA11. 
Results: Research findings showed 0.28 elasticity for the physicians, elasticity for  nurses, number of beds , outpatient reception and other staffs were 0.10, 0.95, 0.30 and -0.11 respectively. In other words, the most production in these hospitals was dependent on the number of beds. It was an economic activity that consumed a lot of capital. The sum of the coefficients of the production function was 0.88 and the return to the scale was downward.
Conclusion: The findings of this study showed that hospital beds have great importance in increasing production. Therefore, the rate of active bed occupancy in these hospitals is high and has the largest role in the production of hospitals or the number of inpatient discharge. 

Background and Aim: In medical sciences, students need problem-solving and decision-making abilities to cure diseases. The present study aims to survey the critical thinking disposition between freshman and senior students in School of Allied Medical Sciences in 2012- 2013 academic year.
Materials and Methods: In this descriptive cross-sectional study, 250 students were selected randomly and their critical thinking disposition was assessed. "The Ricketts critical thinking disposition scale (2003)" consists of 33 multiple choice questions; the scale was used by the researcher to assess the critical thinking disposition. Finally, the data was analyzed by t-test and ANOVA using SPSS software.
Results: The mean of students’ critical thinking disposition was 3.54 which shows that this ability was on the average among students. Also, the t-test results showed that there was a difference between freshmen and seniors. The critical thinking disposition was compared between students in various fields; the results did not reveal a significant difference.   
Conclusion: In spite of the high critical thinking disposition achieved by senior students and the similar guidance in different fields of study for enhancing the disposition, the variable is not at the ideal and expected level. Therefore, it is necessary to use certain materials and measures in educational planning so that the disposition level can get close to the ideal level.

Background and Aim: There has been a long-lasting debate among medical laboratory-associated specialists about required competencies and educational background to qualify for directing medical laboratories in Iran. The aim of this study was to provide a comprehensive review regarding required training and competencies for becoming a medical laboratory director in Iran and all around the world.
Materials and Methods: A thorough search of the literature was carried out in scientific databases including Web of Science, Science Direct, Springer Link, Wiley Online, PubMed, Scopus, SID and web-based search engines such as Google and Google Scholar.
Results: The results revealed detailed required competencies for directing medical laboratories in the United States of America, Canada, European Federation of Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (EFLM) and its many affiliated European countries.
Conclusion: Our results indicate that in all assessed countries, specialists of basic medical sciences and also physicians, after passing certifying examinations, are equally qualified to direct medical laboratories. Indeed, Iran is the only country within the evaluated ones, in which basic medical sciences specialists (which have their own specific curriculum and are educated as clinical majors) have been eliminated from directing medical laboratory and the position has almost exclusively been available for graduates of pathology and it is important to revise this approach.

Background & Aim: Spiritual quotient is an essential factor of managers’ competencies for development of organizations. The managers need high spiritual quotient to impress the staffs’ organizational commitment. This research is aimed to determine the correlation between the managers’ spiritual quotient with the employees organizational commitment in Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS).
Materials and Methods: This research was a descriptive-analytical, and cross-section study that induced in TUMS headquarters among 80 of the managers and 225 of the staffs at 2014-2015. The research tools were two questionnaires, including spiritual quotient and organizational commitment that used after the validity and reliability of these questionnaires was confirmed. The data was analyzed by SPSS software, average and standard deviation, for descriptive results, and used T-Test, One-Way Variance Analysis, and Pearson technique for analytical statistics. 
Results: Average of the managers’ spiritual quotient was desired. Although, the average of the staffs organizational commitment was moderate. There was a significant correlation between spiritual quotient of managers with organizational commitment of the staffs (p=0.034). 
Conclusion: The managers should emphasize to develop their spiritual quotient in order to promote the organizational commitment of the staffs. Using organizational psychologist to develop this relationship is our suggestion.

Background and Aim: Because human health is a strategic priority for all communities, investing in this sector will be very important. The purpose of this research is to evaluate the efficacy of hospitals affiliated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences from 2013 to 2015 and their ranking, and provide a perspective for dynamic managers in this area.
Materials and Methods: This is an applied study, and in terms of nature, it is descriptive. The statistical population of this study was 13 hospitals of this university. In this research, the efficacy of hospitals during the years 2013 to 2015 through the data envelopment analysis and Output-based method was evaluated. By carefully examining global research, input and output indicators were identified. Input indexes were the number of beds and the number of doctors (general, residents and specialists); and output indexes were the total days of hospitalization, the number of outpatients, and the number of bed-days.
Results: According to the study model, university hospitals with high efficiency to low efficiency are as follows: Arash, Bahrami, Zanan, Roozbeh, Amiralam, Ziaeeyan, Baharlou, Razi, Valiasr, Sina, Farabi, Imam Khomeini and Shariati hospitals.
Conclusion: According to output-based method, by calculating the efficiency mean of hospitals during the years 2013 to 2015; Arash hospital, Bahrami hospital and Zanan hospital are determined to be the most efficient; and, Farabi hospital, Imam Khomeini hospital, and Shariati hospital are the ones with the lowest efficiency.

Background and Aim: Technical videos and images are of great importance in learning different topics of medical sciences. This study is conducted to determine the effect of videos and images in learning from students’ point of view and also their problems in accessing them.
Materials and Methods: This is a survey study. Data were collected by a self-made questionnaire and the population included postgraduate students of Qazvin University of Medical Sciences in the first semester of 94-95.
Results: More than half of the students stated that images and videos have an average or more-than-average effect on their learning achievements. There is no significant relationship between students’ fields of study and their feeling the need for specialized images and videos. To get advice, they refer more to their professors or classmates than to librarians. A large number of responding students had not heard even the names of specialized image-and-video databases or they had never used them before. Low-speed internet and filtering of sites are the most important factors in students’ failure to access their required images and videos while students themselves have ranked ‘unfamiliarity with specialized databases’ as the fourth important factor.
Conclusion: The students know the importance of images and videos in learning achievements, but since they don’t know the professional databases and don’t have an appropriate interaction with librarians, they resort to general search-engines and, as a result, they face with blocked sites and are deprived from what they really want.

Background and Aim: Creativity and innovation are considered among the most important factors that help an organization survive. Therefore, it seems necessary to examine the status of this important issue in healthcare organizations such as hospitals. The present study was conducted to determine the relationship between organizational innovation and creativity among the staff of teaching hospitals of Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS).  
Materials and Methods: This descriptive-analytical and cross-sectional study was conducted on 285 staff members of TUMS selected teaching hospitals in 2015. To collect the required data, demographic data form, organizational creativity 
questionnaire and Martin Patchen’s innovation questionnaire were used. Data were analyzed in SPSS software version 21, using descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA and Pearson correlation analysis at a less-than-0.05 significance level. 
Results: The organizational creativity rate for the studied staff showed an average of 2.99±0.80, assessed at middle and lower middle levels and the organizational innovation rate showed an average of 19.37±3.71, assessed as middle and upper middle. A statistically significant relationship was observed between organizational creativity and organizational innovation (p=0.02, r=0.20).
Conclusion: The results suggest that an increase in creativity leads to an increase in innovation. Therefore, to survive and maintain a competitive advantage to provide more desirable treatment services at a high quality, hospital managers are required to use their best effort and expenditure so that they can enhance innovation within their organizations.

Background & Aim: Planning in medical tourism is important. This study was conducted to assess factors, elements and development plans of medical tourism and situation study and analysis of Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS).
Materials and Methods: This mixed method study was conducted in 2017. In systematic review, published studies searched between years 2006 to 2016. In the second phase, medical tourism data of TUMS explored as retrospective cross sectional and expert viewpoint analysis in medical tourism concept. 
Results: 39 published articles were assessed. According to results, admissions and total payment of foreign patients in all hospitals of TUMS in 2016 were 21788 and around 18.5 billion Tomans respectively.
Qualitative results showed that, there were not transparence program and suitable physical area and TUMS needs to comprehensive planning, supportive infrastructure of foreign patients, correction of transportation system and improve marketing.
Conclusion: Despite the history of TUMS hospitals in attraction of foreign patients and analyzing it, there were many limitations to achieve good situation. Although assessing patients viewpoints can provide a platform to solve problems and limitations according to priorities. 

Background and Aim: In each organization, there is a debate about the use of IT. Human development is one of the factors influencing the efficiency and success of any organization. The present study aimed to investigate the effects of information technology on empowerment of staff working in Tehran University of Medical Sciences.
Materials and Methods: This study was descriptive-survey research and applied in terms of purpose. A total of 274 staff members from the Tehran University of Medical Sciences were surveyed by sampling according to the Krejcie-Morgan table from among 950 employees. The tools used in the Ardalan questionnaire were divided into two parts of IT, including 10 questions and a staff empowerment questionnaire containing 23 questions. Data were analyzed by SPSS 13 software, Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and one-sample T-test.
Results: The research findings showed that the use of information technology on five dimensions of job empowerment including competency, improvement of quality of work, increased decision-making power, increasing self-control, and reducing job stress have a significant effect.
Conclusion: The most important task of managers of universities is to improve the ability and job satisfaction of employees, holding in-service training courses in the field of computers and the Internet and encouraging employees to use more computers in their related activities.

Background and Aim: With the development of the Internet and databases and the increasing need to institutionalize evidence-based medicine, physicians' awareness and use of evidence-based medical databases and concepts are considered to be necessary. Therefore, the aim of this study is to evaluate the knowledge and use of evidence-based medical concepts and databases among residents of Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences (SBMU).
Materials and Methods: The present study is an applied and descriptive research. The population of this study comprised 192 SBMU residents in 2016. A questionnaire was used for data collection and SPSS software was applied for data analysis.
Results: The findings showed that residents obtained 2.99 for knowledge and 2.73 for the use of evidence-based medical databases out of a total average of 5 points, which indicates that their knowledge and practical use of evidence-based medical databases are moderate. Databases about which residents have the highest knowledge and practical use are UpToDate, PubMed Clinical Queries, and 
Cochrane, respectively. 
Conclusion: The majority of residents at Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences do not have sufficient awareness about databases and concepts of evidence-based medicine; in fact, most of the resources that are used to answer their information needs are non-evidence-based resources. Therefore, planning to accept evidence-based medicine and databases and teach them to residents is essential.

Background and Aim: The review of scientific products in reputable international databases is a guideline for policy-making and planning, in addition to determining the present status and shortcomings. The aim of this study is to investigate the scientific products of the research centers affiliated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences (TUMS) and Isfahan University of Medical Sciences (MUI) indexed in Scopus during 2009-2013.
Materials and Methods: This is a descriptive, cross-sectional study with a functional approach. All articles of research centers of TUMS (5880 articles) and MUI (2154 articles) from 2009 to 2013 were retrieved from Scopus and analyzed. To compare the means, t-test was used.  Moreover, the data were analyzed by SPSS and Excel softwares.
Results: The scientific products of both universities’ research centers in Scopus index have grown in the years under review. Most of the papers were from Tehran Endocrinology and Metabolism and Isfahan Cardiovascular Research Centers, and most of the products belonged to the subject areas of the endocrinology and metabolism, pharmaceutical sciences and cardiovascular science. No significant difference was found between the scientific products of the centers of the two universities. 
Conclusion: The growth of scientific production of these research centers indicates the importance of scientific products in line with sustainable development in Iran. Presenting the findings of similar studies can be effective in motivating researchers and supporting research by institutions.

Background and Aim: In today's challenging world, the ethical issues of work as a requirement in organizations have always been discussed and its relevance to organizational citizenship behavior as a kind of antitrust behavior has always been raised. The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between organizational citizenship behavior and work ethic among the staffs of the faculties of Tehran university of medical sciences in 2016-2017.
Materials and Methods: The present research was descriptive-analytic and the statistical population of the study was 426 employees of colleges. They were selected according to the Cochran formula as proportional sample and selected by random sampling. Organizational citizenship behavior inventory (1988) and Grigory, et al, Patty (1990) questionnaire, whose validity was assessed by the experts. The cronbach's alpha coefficient, organizational citizenship behavior inventory (0.793), and job ethics (0.764), represent the internal consistency of the questionnaire. For analysis of variables, descriptive statistics and spearman correlation test were used and kolmogorov-smirnov test was used to normalize the data.
Results: Most male respondents, aged between 20-30 years; in terms of graduate degrees, were in a professional contract with a record of 5-10 years. Results showed that there was a positive and significant relationship between organizational citizenship behavior and work ethics (p=0.783).
Conclusions: Higher organizational citizenship behavior leads to higher levels of work ethics. Therefore, by training and strengthening organizational citizenship behavior, the level of work ethics among employees can be improved.