One of every five people in Iran need to check for physical condition

Azerbaijan, Baku, Nov. 30 /Trend S.Isayev, T. Jafarov/

One of every five people in Iran needs to check for physical condition, Vice Chairman for Iran's Supreme Medical Council, doctor Mohamad Reza Norouzi told Mehr News agency.

Norouzi spoke of kidney-related diseases, and said that in 2011, about 30 percent of population in Iran (about 14 million) all have kidney failures.

"They all need check-ups, as every year it is estimated that the number of dialysis patients increases by some 20 percent in Iran," he said.

In medicine dialysis is a process for removing waste and excess water from the blood, and is used primarily to provide an artificial replacement for lost kidney function in people with renal failure.

Dialysis may be used for those with an acute disturbance in kidney function (acute kidney injury, previously acute renal failure), or progressive but chronically worsening kidney function-a state known as chronic kidney disease stage 5 (previously chronic renal failure or end-stage renal disease).

The latter form may develop over months or years, but in contrast to acute kidney injury is not usually reversible, and dialysis is regarded as a "holding measure" until a renal transplant can be performed, or sometimes as the only supportive measure in those for whom a transplant would be inappropriate.

Norouzi noted that Iran has shortage of dialysis machines, noting that there are some 450 places across Iran where some 4,500 such machines are installed.

He said that the 4,500 figure should be at least 6,000, and the half of the existing machines should be substituted, as they are out of date already.

Norouzi said that the most effective way to treat a kidney failur is to use transplants from the brain-dead patients.

"Nearly 32 thousand kidney transplant operations were carried out in Iran since 1986," he said, adding that annually, there are some 2,000 such operations performed in Iran.

Of those annual 2,000 operations, according to Norouzi, 590 operations were done with brain-dead patients serving as donors in 2010, and in 2011 this figure grew to 760 operations.

Because of international sanctions imposed against Iran for its nuclear program, the harsh restrictions have also affected the medicine imports into the country.

Iran's Science Education Agency recently reported that country's labs have nearly gone bankrupt because of sanctions.

Former head of Iran's Laboratories' Management, current assistant to head doctor in Bahonar hospital in Tehran, Hossein Gholami said that while 85-95 percent of labs in Iran are fully standardized, they are not being supported by the government.

He added that the labs are forced to work by tariffs set by the government, and if the inflation and prices continue to rise, these factors would affect the labs' sustainability.

Gholami said that due to high prices and current economic problems in the country, the number of people visiting labs has greatly reduced, since visitors are not able to pay the necessary costs, adding that f such situation continues, a lot of laboratories in Iran will simply close down.