Toward a more stable blood supply: charitable incentives, donation rates, and the experience of September 11

A typology of strategies that recognize, reward, and incentivize blood donation

BACKGROUND

Blood collection agencies (BCAs) worldwide are continuously looking to improve recognition, reward, and incentive (RRI) policies to optimize the recruitment and retention of blood donors. However, given the inconsistent categorization and variety of strategies available, there is a need for a theoretically informed and empirically supported framework to guide RRI research and policy development.

STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS

Survey data from 1028 voluntary nonremunerated whole blood and plasma donors in Australia was used to validate a theorized RRI typology based on distinctions between the level of congruency with the act of donating blood (congruent vs. incongruent), visibility of acknowledgment (public vs. private), benefits provided (self vs. other), and likely reinforcement schedule (fixed vs. variable).

RESULTS

A six-factor solution met all statistical criteria and was most consistent with a priori theoretical underpinnings. The factors were labeled (i) deal promotion, (ii) loyalty program, (iii) BCA token, (iv) health check, (v) charity donation, and (vi) travel compensation.

DISCUSSION

This typology provides researchers with a standardized theoretical and conceptual framework to organize and synthesize findings from the existing literature and help BCAs develop RRI policies that are likely to be successful. We present a future research agenda across and within the RRI strategies.

Exploring Blood Donation Challenges and Mobilization Mechanisms in North China During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Qualitative Study

Purpose

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic disrupted the supply of blood globally, resulting in numerous studies focusing on the challenges in maintaining blood supply, and the responses to it, in countries with a mixed blood donation model. This study explored blood donation challenges and mobilization mechanisms in North China, which employs a non-remunerative donation model, during the COVID-19 pandemic’s first wave.

Materials and Methods

A qualitative approach was adopted to investigate blood donation practices in Chengde from April to June 2020. Data were collected from eight blood donors, six potential donors, three blood donation station leaders, and two government officials, through semi-structured interviews.

Results

The major challenge for blood supply was decreased blood donations, owing to lockdown restrictions, and individual and familial apprehensions. Mobilization mechanisms included bureaucratic and ideological mobilization. However, although group blood donation alleviates the pressure on supply chains during emergencies, it is detrimental to the cultivation of civic engagement in the long run.

Conclusion

This study contributes to the understanding of how countries with uncompensated blood donation models respond to public health emergencies. It suggests that striking a balance between the society’s and the state’s perception of blood donation would allow the state to incorporate the different “voices” of society, and devise an inclusive blood donation policy.

Bringing prosocial values to translational, disease-specific stem cell research

Background

Disease-specific stem cell therapies, created from induced pluripotent stem cell lines containing the genetic defects responsible for a particular disease, have the potential to revolutionize the treatment of refractory chronic diseases. Given their capacity to differentiate into any human cell type, these cell lines might be reprogrammed to correct a disease-causing genetic defect in any tissue or organ, in addition to offering a more clinically realistic model for testing new drugs and studying disease mechanisms. Clinical translation of these therapies provides an opportunity to design a more systematic, accessible and patient-influenced model for the delivery of medically innovative treatments to chronically ill patients.

Discussion

I focus on disease-specific cell therapies because the types of patients who would benefit from them have congenital, severe, high-maintenance chronic conditions. They accordingly have a very strong claim for medical need and therapeutic intervention, must interact regularly with health providers, and so have the greatest stake in influencing, at a systemic level, the way their care is delivered. Given such patients’ shared, aggregate needs for societal support and access to medical innovation, they constitute “patient communities”. To reify the relevance of patient communities within a clinical context, I propose competitive grants or “prizes” to spur innovation in delivery of care, promoting “prosocial” values of transparency, equity, patient empowerment, and patient-provider and inter-institutional collaboration. As facilitators of participant-driven advocacy for health and quality of life-improving measures, patient communities may be synergistic with the broad-based, geo-culturally embedded public health networks typically referred to as “communities” in the public health literature.

Summary

Prosocial values acquire a strong ethical justification based on shared need, and can be clearly defined as grant criteria, when applied to patients such as those who will benefit from disease-specific stem cell treatments. Within this context, prosociality aims not just to expand patients’ treatment choices, but also their opportunities to take a more active role in the management of their own care and contribute towards shared goals through better-informed advocacy. Accordingly, prosociality promotes relational autonomy as well as other basic bioethical principles, including beneficence and a holistic, relational conception of human dignity.