Improving Iraqi school dental services: A GIS-based study of service location optimisation

The United Nations (UN) estimated the population of Iraq in 2005 at almost 29 million, of which nearly 14 million were children aged 0-14 years. Iraq is aiming to improve child oral health, and subsequent child general health, through school dental services, offered by primary health care centres.

To develop and test a GIS-based planning approach for the Hillah district of Iraq as a model for the rest of the country. All data were gathered from open sources.

The city has 98 neighbourhoods, with a total child population of 368 274, occupying 161 Sq. km2, with 14 fixed primary health care dental clinics.

Accessibility zones were created using GIS, based on the ability of dentists to make their way to schools.

A total of 23 307 of 0-4 year-olds (14%) and 74 384 (45%) of 0-15 year-olds lived outside the accessibility zones.

Areas where services are not available to the child population were identified, whether or not they attended primary schools.

Reforming the existing dental health services in Iraq can be achieved by careful planning and appropriate utilisation of health resources.