Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain

Rationale: Family refusal to organ donation of a deceased relative represents one of the most important barriers to organ transplantation. Although a large literature about family decisions has amassed, the existing evidence needs further integration and structuring. Objective: This study seeks to a...

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Authors: López, Jorge S.; Soria-Oliver, María; Aramayona Quintana, Begoña; Martínez García, José Manuel; García Sánchez, Rubén; Martín López, María Jesús; Almendros Rodríguez, Carmen
Format: Article
Publication date:2018
Country:España
Institution:Universidad Autónoma de Madrid
Repository:Biblos-e Archivo. Repositorio Institucional de la UAM
Language:English
OAI Identifier:oai:repositorio.uam.es:10486/717147
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/10486/717147
https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2018.03.039
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:Deceased organ donation
Exploratory multivariate analysis
Family consent
Family decision-making
Quantitative research
Social psychology
Psicología
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author López, Jorge S.
author2 Soria-Oliver, María
Aramayona Quintana, Begoña
Martínez García, José Manuel
García Sánchez, Rubén
Martín López, María Jesús
Almendros Rodríguez, Carmen
author2_role author
author
author
author
author
author
author_browse Almendros Rodríguez, Carmen
Aramayona Quintana, Begoña
García Sánchez, Rubén
López, Jorge S.
Martín López, María Jesús
Martínez García, José Manuel
Soria-Oliver, María
author_facet López, Jorge S.
Soria-Oliver, María
Aramayona Quintana, Begoña
Martínez García, José Manuel
García Sánchez, Rubén
Martín López, María Jesús
Almendros Rodríguez, Carmen
author_role author
collection Biblos-e Archivo. Repositorio Institucional de la UAM
description Rationale: Family refusal to organ donation of a deceased relative represents one of the most important barriers to organ transplantation. Although a large literature about family decisions has amassed, the existing evidence needs further integration and structuring. Objective: This study seeks to analyse relationships between bereaved relatives’ decisions and a wide range of factors that converge in the family decision process, including interactions and complex relationship patterns, and taking psychosocial theoretical frameworks as reference to conceptualize empirical findings. Method: This observational study examined 16 Spanish hospitals during a 36-month period. Transplant coordination teams collected data of 421 cases of family decision processes about donation (338 donations/83 refusals) through a previously validated instrument. Indicators of the following factors were collected: deceased's characteristics; circumstances of death; bereaved relatives’ characteristics, beliefs, and expressions; behaviour of health and coordination staff; and family's emotional responses. Three global hypotheses related to bivariate and multivariate relations of factors with family decisions and relationships/interactions among factors were tested. Results: Relatives’ beliefs about the deceased's wishes concerning donation are the strongest predictor of family decisions. However, family decisions are also related to the deceased's characteristics, relatives’ characteristics, satisfaction with medical attention, satisfaction with personal treatment and relatives’ emotional responses, and other factors. Relatives’ emotional reactions are related to satisfaction with health-staff interventions and condition family decision, even if deceased's will concerning donation is known and positive. Relatives’ beliefs about deceased's wishes concerning donation vary as a function of deceased's characteristics and according to relatives’ characteristics. Conclusions: Understanding of family decisions underlying organ donation may greatly benefit from a more complex, integrated, and theoretically based approach. Educational efforts should stress the need to register or simply communicate own willingness to donate organs. However, an adequate training and performance of the health-staff involved in the organ donation process may generate substantive differences in consent rates
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publishDate 2018
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reponame_str Biblos-e Archivo. Repositorio Institucional de la UAM
spelling Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain López, Jorge S. Soria-Oliver, María Aramayona Quintana, Begoña Martínez García, José Manuel García Sánchez, Rubén Martín López, María Jesús Almendros Rodríguez, Carmen Deceased organ donation Exploratory multivariate analysis Family consent Family decision-making Quantitative research Social psychology Psicología Rationale: Family refusal to organ donation of a deceased relative represents one of the most important barriers to organ transplantation. Although a large literature about family decisions has amassed, the existing evidence needs further integration and structuring. Objective: This study seeks to analyse relationships between bereaved relatives’ decisions and a wide range of factors that converge in the family decision process, including interactions and complex relationship patterns, and taking psychosocial theoretical frameworks as reference to conceptualize empirical findings. Method: This observational study examined 16 Spanish hospitals during a 36-month period. Transplant coordination teams collected data of 421 cases of family decision processes about donation (338 donations/83 refusals) through a previously validated instrument. Indicators of the following factors were collected: deceased's characteristics; circumstances of death; bereaved relatives’ characteristics, beliefs, and expressions; behaviour of health and coordination staff; and family's emotional responses. Three global hypotheses related to bivariate and multivariate relations of factors with family decisions and relationships/interactions among factors were tested. Results: Relatives’ beliefs about the deceased's wishes concerning donation are the strongest predictor of family decisions. However, family decisions are also related to the deceased's characteristics, relatives’ characteristics, satisfaction with medical attention, satisfaction with personal treatment and relatives’ emotional responses, and other factors. Relatives’ emotional reactions are related to satisfaction with health-staff interventions and condition family decision, even if deceased's will concerning donation is known and positive. Relatives’ beliefs about deceased's wishes concerning donation vary as a function of deceased's characteristics and according to relatives’ characteristics. Conclusions: Understanding of family decisions underlying organ donation may greatly benefit from a more complex, integrated, and theoretically based approach. Educational efforts should stress the need to register or simply communicate own willingness to donate organs. However, an adequate training and performance of the health-staff involved in the organ donation process may generate substantive differences in consent rates This work received financial support from the Fund for Health Research of the Spanish Ministry of Health and Consumer Affairs (FIS 95/0538) Elsevier http://hdl.handle.net/10486/717147 https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2018.03.039
spellingShingle Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain
López, Jorge S.
Deceased organ donation
Exploratory multivariate analysis
Family consent
Family decision-making
Quantitative research
Social psychology
Psicología
title Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain
title_full Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain
title_fullStr Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain
title_full_unstemmed Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain
title_short Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain
title_sort Bereaved relatives’ decision about deceased organ donation: An integrated psycho-social study conducted in Spain
topic Deceased organ donation
Exploratory multivariate analysis
Family consent
Family decision-making
Quantitative research
Social psychology
Psicología
topic_facet Deceased organ donation
Exploratory multivariate analysis
Family consent
Family decision-making
Quantitative research
Social psychology
Psicología
url http://hdl.handle.net/10486/717147
https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2018.03.039