Hospital Nurses' Knowledge and Attitude toward Brain-dead Organ Donation

The purpose of this study was to investigate hospital nurses' knowledge and attitude toward brain-dead organ donation and determine the relationship between the two. Data were collected from 210 hospital nurses with structured self-administered questionnaires from May 15, 2015 until May 30 and analyzed using SPSS Version 21.0. First, the means and standard deviations of hospital nurses' knowledge and attitude toward brain-dead organ donation were 12.66 2.01 out of 17 and 3.56 0.44 out of 5, respectively. Second, there were no significant differences in hospital nurses' knowledge and attitude toward brain-dead organ donation by working departments (ward) and organ donation education experience. Third, knowledge toward brain-dead organ donation played an important positive role in forming a positive attitude toward brain-dead organ donation. The development of education program on brain-dead organ donation, the evaluation system on educational performance and hospital nurses' enhanced interests in brain-dead organ donation are needed in order to improve the knowledge and positive attitude toward brain-dead organ donation.