To give or to receive? Opinions of teenagers on kidney donation.
BACKGROUND
The attitude toward living donation varies widely in the world, for economic and cultural reasons. In Italy, as in other Mediterranean settings, the role of living kidney donation is minor.


OBJECTIVE
To analyze the reasons for this attitude, we gathered data in a general population sample of high school students in a large northern Italian industrial city (Torino, about 900,000 inhabitants).


METHODS
Semistructured questionnaires (n = 1676), gathered in 2001 to 2002 in 14 high schools, in the context of an educational program on dialysis, renal transplantation, and organ donation, were analyzed presumably reflecting opinions gathered before the educational intervention.


RESULTS
Most students, in the case of a close relative or partner needing dialysis, answer that they would donate a kidney (yes: 78.2%, no: 2.9%, uncertain-blank: 18.9%); receiving a living donor kidney is felt as disturbing: only 57.5% of the students would accept it (no: 5.9%, uncertain-blank: 36.6%), mainly because of fear of long-term problems for the donor. Donation from an older to a younger person is seen more positively than vice versa.


CONCLUSIONS
In our settings, the attitude of the teenagers on living donation is positive; however, while "giving" is positively seen, the presence of unresolved fears is witnessed by the lower acceptance of the idea of "taking." These data suggest to focus on the risks of kidney donation in educational campaigns and in patient-physician information. The positive attitude shared by the teenagers supports the working hypothesis that lack of information is one of the determinants of the low living donor transplantation rate in our area.
Piccoli
G B
GB
Cattedra di Nefrologia, Dipartimento di Medicina Interna, Università di Torino, Torino, Italy. gbpiccoli@yahoo.it
Soragna
G
G
Putaggio
S
S
Burdese
M
M
Bergamo
D
D
Mezza
E
E
Gai
M
M
Motta
D
D
Rossetti
M
M
Malfi
B
B
Anania
P
P
Marchetti
P
P
Vistoli
F
F
Barsotti
M
M
Bianchi
A M
AM
Longo
P
P
Rinaldi
D
D
Giacchino
F
F
Jeantet
A
A
Boggi
U
U
Segoloni
G P
GP
D000293:Adolescent; D001294:Attitude to Health; D006801:Humans; D007558:Italy; D019520:Living Donors; D000297:Psychology, Adolescent; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014019:Tissue Donors / Q000523:psychology*; D014180:Transplantation / Q000523:psychology*