Study of education effect on nurse's knowledge and attitudes about organ donation at the time of brain death

The frequency of organ transplantation in Iran in compare with European countries and United States is remarkably low and it is because of transplantable organ shortage and because of this thousands of people have been died annually, this is while we encounter with some cases of brain death every day that the organs of these patients with brain death can save life of the patients who are in need of these organs. The aim of this study was “to assess the effect of education on knowledge and attitude of nurses about organ donation”.

This research was a semi-experimental in the form of test-retest study. The group of the study was 120 nurses of ICU and emergency wards of Kerman hospitals who participated in the educational seminar of brain death. Data were collected by a self-designed questionnaire. The questionnaire was completed by the nurses once in the first day of the seminar (before education) and once after presenting related education (after two weeks).

Results showed that before education the least knowledge was about three organs of lung, pancreas and marrow that it was 73.3%, 57.5%, and 54.2% respectively, while after education it had been increased 95%, 91.7% and 80%, respectively (P<0.001). The average of nurses’ knowledge about process of brain death and donation after education was 9.4 (±0.78) that in compare with before education had 7.5 (± 2.6) significant increase (P<0.001). Total average of nurses’ attitude towards process of brain death and organ donation before training course was 65.7 (±13.7) which had been significantly increased to 76.9 (±8.7) two weeks after education (P<0.001).

The present study showed that more educational programs are necessary for increasing knowledge about brain death and organ donation among health staff especially in ICU and emergency wards that are starter of diagnosis process of brain death patients. Special education should be started from university level and should be continued in the form of in-service training. It is clear that these efforts are going to make remarkable increase of positive attitudes towards organ donation in Iran.