Attitude and Performance of Staff Working in Educational Hospitals Regarding Organ Donation

Introduction: The demand for organ donation has increased in most countries of the world, while the number of donors remains relatively stable. Objective: The aim of this study was to determine the attitude and performance of physicians and nurses in Rasht city. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional descriptive analytical study was conducted to investigate the attitude and performance of physicians and nurses working in educational centers in Rasht. The sample size was 423 people (296 nurses and 94 physicians), who were selected using stratified random sampling in December 2014. The research instrument was a researcher-made questionnaire, including socio-demographic characteristics and attitude questions that were analyzed using Independent t-test, ANOVA and Chi-square. Results: The findings indicated that 62.5% of the samples responded to the questionnaire using ‘no idea’ option (no agreement, no disagreement). Blood donation card recipients (P=0.05) and those whose relatives had donation card (P=0.035) along with those with organ donator card (P=0.05) had a more ‘agreed’ attitude. There was also a statistically significant relationship among the those with blood donation card and blood donation history (P=0.008), people having relatives with organ donation card (p=0.001), the presence of a member among close relatives (P=0.024), and having experience of taking care of the donor or recipient (P=0.002) with the performance of subjects (having organ donation card). Conclusion: The results of this study show that the role of physicians and nurses in encouraging people for organ donation and, therefore, promoting health in the community is not at a desirable level. Therefore, health practitioners and policymakers had been asked to propose solutions for correcting the culture of post-mortem organ donation in order to promote good attitudes and take basic measures in managerial, research, and care areas