Assessment of Knowledge and Practice of Blood Donation among Undergraduate students of University of Jos, Plateau State, Nigeria

Abstract

Blood transfusion has been considered a vital therapeutic approach in modern health care that can save millions of lives, but there remains a challenge in blood donation practices. The study aimed to assess the knowledge and practice of blood donation among undergraduates of chemistry, University of Jos. A cross sectional survey design was adopted for this study and out of 704 respondents, 255 students were sampled to participate in the study. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data for the study and analysis was done by descriptive and inferential statistics. The results indicated that majority (96.1%) among the respondents had a good knowledge about blood donation but the practice of blood donation among the students was low (57.6%). On the factors hampering students from voluntary blood donation, selling of the products (47.0%) was among the factors discouraging students as well as inadequate information (29.8%). The adverse effects of blood donation discouraging students stems from fainting attacks (36.1%), dizziness (31.0%), and generalized body weakness (25.1%). There was a significant association existing between knowledge and practice of blood donation among the undergraduate students (Chi=7.64 > Crit. V=3.84; P > 0.05). The study concluded that although majority of the students had a good knowledge regarding blood donation, but the practice was low; inadequate information, selling of blood and adverse effects of blood donation were found to be significantly associated with hampering blood donation practices, hence the need to educate the students on the benefits of blood donation.