Purpose: To understand barriers in registering as an organ donor amongst students at a predominantly Hispanic institution.

Methods: Self-identified adult (ages 18 and above) Hispanic students were recruited. Participants were verbally consented, and then given a confidential 32-question survey (derived from two previously published articles) that was comprised of a free response section, current donor status and six domains as follows: a) fears and concerns about organ donation, b) altruism and benefits of donation, c) discomforts or worries about registry and organ procurement, d) awareness about the process of signing up as a donor, e) social support issues, and f) the acknowledgement of the need to donate. SPSS software was used to conduct exploratory factor analysis and logistic regression analysis. The free responses (qualitative data) were analyzed and compared to the quantitative results.

Results: 301 surveys met the inclusion criteria for analysis for the quantitative data, and 232 for the qualitative data. The model that included age, gender, and all six domains was significant and predicted 78.7% of student donor status correctly (area under the ROC curve = 0.807). Students who acknowledged the need to donate (f) were less likely (OR=0.409) to be a donor, given other factors were kept the same. If the average score was increased one unit on the domain of awareness (d), then the student was more likely (OR=5.423) to be a donor. If the average score on the domains of fear (a) and worry (c) related items was respectively increased one unit, then the student was less likely to be a donor (OR=0.263 and 0.595 respectively). The analysis of the free response section showed that the majority of organ donors (78%) cited altruism (b) as their reason to donate. Where as awareness (d) and fears (a) were the main cited reasons why students were not organ donors (36% and 22% respectively).

Conclusions: The qualitative analysis correlates with the quantitative survey data. Increasing awareness about organ donation registration, and alleviating fears and worries may increase the number of registered donors from this population. Interestingly, the free responses show an in depth understanding of the concerns of this population.

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