Organ Donation Attitudes and Practices among African Americans: An Adapted Measurement Instrument

This study reports the psychometric properties and correlates of a measure of organ donation attitudes and practices for African Americans.

We surveyed 736 members from 14 alumni chapters of historically African American sororities and fraternities in Michigan. We constructed subscales and compared subscale values with two variables related to donation status: 1) enrollment status in the state donor registry, and 2) intentions for future enrollment.

Psychometric analyses indicated our measure tapped four distinct domains of attitudes concerning donation. The four subscales identified-General Benefits, Race Benefits, General Barriers, and Disparity Barriers-had good psychometric properties. For all four scales the more positive the attitudes toward donation held by the respondent, the more likely they were to report having signed up to be an organ donor.

An understanding of attitudes toward donation may help development of effective culturally sensitive intervention messages targeting the African American community.