Survey about the reason why people do or do not donate blood / Mior Muhammad Saifuldin Mior Affendi and Muhammad Eusman Danyal Azmi

Although the COVID-19 pandemic has gradually become controllable, it greatly impacts transfusion medicine, especially because of the cancellation of daily blood donation campaigns and donor recruitment becoming less than usual. The shortage of blood supply and demand in our country and the world is significantly affecting blood transfusion services. This study is conducted to assess the knowledge and awareness among the UiTM Health Sciences students regarding blood donation. This study is cross-sectional among the students from Medical Laboratory Technology, Occupational Therapy, Physiotherapy, Nursing and Environmental Health between December 2022 and May 2023. A total of 48 respondents participated in this study. All the respondents knew what blood donation is and agreed that it is very important. 81.3% of the respondents showed a positive perception of blood donation and 18.8% of the respondents remained neutral about blood donation. Most of the respondents at 68.8% did not have the experience of donating blood while 31.3% of the respondents have already donated blood. 63.2% of the respondents who donated blood did so to help someone in need of blood. The remaining respondents were motivated to donate blood to gain approval from someone, to gain financial support, and said “I came across a mobile donation unit.”. 58.1% of the respondents who have never donated blood failed to meet the requirement to donate blood and 23.3% of them feared donating blood. The remaining respondents did not donate blood because they said, “No one ever asked me to donate blood.”, “I do not think that there is a need for donating blood.” or “People told me not to donate blood.”. Although all the respondents agreed that blood donation is helpful to patients, only 83.3% of the respondents were willing to donate blood in future and 16.7% of the respondents were still unsure whether they will donate blood in the future or not. The knowledge and awareness of some of the respondents were lacking as they feared donating blood. However, fourth-fifth of the respondents expressed that they were willing to donate blood in the future if they had the chance. To alleviate the fears associated with blood donation,