Recruitment and Retention of Voluntary Blood Donors Through Electronic Communication

Dear Editor, Recruitment of voluntary blood donors is an important task. Human blood is an essential element of the human life and there are no substitutes for it (1) . Studies have proved that voluntary blood donation enhances safe blood transfusion (2) when compared to replacement blood donation. The need for blood is growing day by day as a result of the advancement in the clinical medicine (3). Recruiting new blood donors and retention of them should be a main target of a blood bank (4). Many tailor made strategies are being adopted to meet their need for blood and blood products. Non-availability of blood for the needy on time is an everlasting social problem. It is our social responsibility to save human lives by donating the gift of blood to save valuable lives. The blood banks aim at sourcing safe regular, repeat voluntary blood donors, who are fully aware of transfusion transmissible infections (TTIs) and committed to providing safe blood to the recipients. Voluntary blood donation camps should be organized in schools, colleges, villages and towns, so that nonblood donors are exposed to features of such camps. Observing the activities of these camps could motivate them to become volunteers themselves. During the camps, organizers may use electronic media and other sources for motivating blood donors. SMS, emails, websites, electronic and social networks are fast and appropriate tools to convey information for motivating bulk donors among youth and literates. Sending bulk messages through email, SMS and popular social networks like Facebook, Twitter, Linked In, Google plus, Orkut and Tagged could help motivators to recruit more blood donors in a broader area. Religious festivals, marriage receptions, birthday celebrations of political leaders etc. could also be used to recruit more potential blood donors. The camp organizer could do the registration at the proposed venue, with donor details including mobile phone and email address two or three days prior to the commencement of voluntary blood donation. After collecting all this information details about camp date and time, venue and other information can be sent to the registered donors through phone, SMS, email, electronic and social networks. This will help donors to prepare themselves to take part in the donation drives. Attractive thank-you messages could be sent to all the blood donors with reminders of the next due date for donation. Electronic communication can be a useful tool in recruiting and retaining more blood donors to overcome blood shortages.