Health System in Syria 2000 - 2024
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Dataset for a research project on the health system in Syria 2000 - 2024: a systematic review
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The conceptual framework for this study is based on the World Health Organization's (WHO) six building blocks of the health system: service delivery, health workforce, health information systems, access to essential medicines, health financing, and leadership and governance (Manyazewal, 2017). Consequently, a deductive approach was employed, utilizing this framework to structure the research, with the building blocks serving as thematic categories for analysis. The list of definitions of the health system building blocks used for thematic analysis is available in the supplementary documents (WHO, 2010). The literature review was undertaken in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. The research protocol was registered on the Open Science Framework (OSF) Database of Systematic Reviews (DOI: 10.17605/OSF.IO/R4B37). A comprehensive literature search was conducted on PubMed, MEDLINE, Scopus, and google schoolar databases. Due to the lack of peer-review publications, grey literature and government reports were included. In addition, reference list screening and hand searching were performed to identify additional relevant studies. Studies were considered for inclusion if they met the following criteria: pertinent to the health system in Syria, specifically pertaining to the Syrian population (excluding studies on Syrian refugees), and addressed aspects of the national health system under the central government in Damascus. Only articles published in English or Arabic were included. Conversely, studies examining health systems in regions outside government control during the conflict were excluded from this review. The search encompassed studies published between 2000 and 2024, aligning with the assumption that significant systematic changes in Syria's health system commenced in the year 2000 (Bar, 2006). The detailed search strategy, including key search terms and queries, is provided in the supplementary documents. Rayyan software was utilized to manage the screening process. An external reviewer was invited to conduct a blinded screening of the search results. Any discrepancies or undecided articles were resolved through discussion between the primary author and the external reviewer. Quality and bias were assessed at a study level using the QualSyst system for quantitative and qualitative studies (Kmet et al., 2004). The final list of included articles was uploaded to QDA Miner software program (available on PROVALIS: https://provalisresearch.com/), where coding, thematic analysis, and synthesis were performed.