Turkish university students' opinions towards blood donation
Özet
University students constitute an important
cohort for the supplement of voluntary blood donation
considering their age and dynamism. With this study, it is
aimed to find out Turkish university students' positive and
negative opinions towards blood donation in addition to
interpreting their motivators and barriers to this issue. For
this reason, a qualitative study was conducted with a total
of 141 students studying in one of the governmental
universities in the west part of Turkey. Data were collected
with the help of a semi-structured interview form which
involved 10 questions and analyzed by means of content
analysis. As a result, it was determined that university
students possessed insufficient knowledge and
misconceptions related to blood donation. Also, more than
half of the students were found to not donate blood before.
Being sensible was the most frequent reason stated by the
students for donating blood. On the other hand, anemia was
the main reason of not donating blood for females and fear
was the main reason for males. In the light of the findings,
it is thought that focusing on factors such as Red Crescent
blood collection vehicle, blood collection stands at the
university campuses and positive effects on health might
play important role to turn university students into
voluntary regular donors.
