Why do some apheresis donors donate blood just once?
GROUND AND OBJECTIVES: More knowledge about the reasons for non-return of blood donors (BD) would enable blood donation services (BDS) to improve the efficacy of recruitment and retention programmes. We interviewed returning (RBD) and non-returning apheresis BDs (NRBD) of our university hospital-based BDS. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A questionnaire was sent to 1218 individuals who passed the initial health check with no more than one subsequent blood donation. A similar questionnaire was answered by 235 randomly incoming RBDs. We asked for age, sex, profession, education level, motives to donate blood and, if applicable, reasons for non-return. These data were compared between NRBDs and RBDs and were analysed in relationship to the reasons for non-return. RESULTS: We received 267 answered questionnaires (21.9%). As 32 individuals indicated that they had been permanently deferred and 47 BDs had donated blood elsewhere, 188 NRBDs remained for further analysis. We found more women than men am
