Comparison of demographics and motivations of highly committed whole blood and platelet donors

To compare donor demographics and motivations for donation, we surveyed 159 consecutive whole blood donors (WD) and 146 consecutive plateletpheresis donors. All donors had donation experiences of at least 2 gallons (i.e., 16 previous donations). Evaluation of answers to fixed-response and open-ended questions revealed no difference between the two groups in age, type of wages, compensation by employer, "time off" for donation, and church or volunteer organization memberships. The two groups differed in that the platelet donor (PD) group had a higher percentage of males than females (PD group 72.6% males and 27.4% females versus WD group 59% males and 41% females [chi-square = .01]). PDs most often began donating platelets because they were asked (22.6%), demonstrating the importance of active recruitment. When asked why they do not donate platelet products by apheresis, highly committed WDs reported lack of time (25%), lack of knowledge ("Don't know about it," 21%), lack of recruitment ("No one asked," 18.5%), or lack of awareness ("Never though about it," 5%) as reasons. Factors centering on time constraints, lack of knowledge or awareness about platelet donation by apheresis, and lack of active recruitment prohibit highly committed WDs from entering into plateletpheresis programs.