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Haematology (incl blood transfusion)
Research
Views and attitudes towards blood donation: a qualitative investigation of Indian non-donors living in England
  1. Dhaara Joshi,
  2. Richard Meakin
  1. The Research Department of Primary Care and Population Health, University College London Medical School, London, UK
  1. Correspondence to Dr Richard Meakin; r.meakin{at}ucl.ac.uk

Abstract

Objective To explore the views and attitudes of Indians living in England on blood donation.

Background In light of the predicted shortages in blood supply, it is vital to consider ways in which to maximise donation rates. These include addressing the issue of lower donation rates among ethnic minorities, including Indians. However research specifically among minority ethnicities in UK is sparse.

Setting General practice in North London.

Participants A convenience sample of 12 non-donor Indians living in England.

Methods This is a qualitative investigation involving semistructured interviews. Themes derived were analysed using thematic framework analysis.

Results Five key themes emerged from the data, and these concerned participants’ perspectives regarding attitudes towards blood, blood donation as a ‘good thing’, donation disincentives, the recipient matters and the donor matters.

Conclusion A variety of attitudes were presented, but were generally positive, and blood was conceptualised in a manner previously found to be consistent with donation. However, lack of awareness and accessibility were prominent barriers, indicating the need for improvement in these capacities. In contrast to this, blood was also greatly associated with family and acted as a symbol of kinship: this ‘emotional charge’ often acted to dissuade participants from separating with their blood through donation. Possibly due to this, there was also a strong preference for donated blood to be distributed within the family, as opposed to strangers. This presents a potential barrier to blood donation for some Indians within the current system in which donations are given to unknown recipients.

  • qualitative research
  • public health

This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2017-018279

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors DJ and RM were both involved in all of the following stages: design of the study, analysis and interpretation of the data, writing up the report, and final approval of the version to be published. DJ carried out the interviews.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Patient consent Detail has been removed from this case description/these case descriptions to ensure anonymity. The editors and reviewers have seen the detailed information available and are satisfied that the information backs up the case the authors are making.

    • Ethics approval Ethical approval was granted by East of Scotland Research Ethics Service in February 2015.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Data sharing statement There are no additional unpublished data from the study.