“Donate blood, be a hero!” Project – FASMR Romania

Name of the activity: “Donate blood, be a hero!” Project

Country/NMO: FASMR Romania

Program: Health Systems

Contact information: contact [email protected] to get in touch with the Activity Coordinator

Type of the activity: Continuous Activity

Category: Campaign

Focus area: Organ, stem-cell and tissue donation

Sustainable Development Goals addressed: SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being)

General description:

We, as medical students, want to raise awareness about the deficiency of blood suplies, therefore we organise campaigns in different of cities with medical faculties. This year, there was not only an increase in the number of cities where our campaign was held, including the expansion Republic of Moldova, but there was an increase in the number of donors as well.We managed to create a steady and stable project in every participating city, thus ensuring continuity in the future.

Problem statement:

One of the main problems in Romania is the lack of knowledge of the general population and attitude towards blood donation – the number of blood donors has remained unchanged or has fallen. Studies suggest that Romania is one of the countries with the lowest percentage of blood donors, as only a small percentage of the population regularly donates blood. We want to remind the population that the need for blood is constant and to encourage people to donate constantly. 

Target groups:

• General population
• Medical students
• Healthcare Students
• Other Students
• Doctors
• Other health professionals
• Youth

Beneficiaries:

• General population
• Doctors
• Youth
• Migrants
• Refugees

Objectives:

Continuous public education and delivering accurate information via social media on the importance of having a steady supply of fresh blood to a total audience of around 10.000 people.

We expect a total of around 7000 donors in the campaigns organised in the cities of our universities, as well as about 9.000 donors in the cities without medical universities, where we organise the campaign with help of students from nursing schools.

Preparing a group of trained volunteers to assist local blood banks with specific actions necessary during blood donation – around 750 students in total.

Promote awareness of the significance of regular blood donation through ensuring campaigns Via press/radio/television/leaflets to reach at least 80% of past donors and 80% of the medical students. This is very important, as we want to not only promote our campaign, but also to raise awareness about blood donation in general to the people living in the cities where we organised it.

Indicators:

1. a. Volunteers from at least 1 Faculty of Medicine will speak about blood donation to students in schools and universities (about 30 students)
2. the project’s national page will share information about blood donation at least once a month
3. the number of blood donors across the country will increase by 20% compared to an average week

3.a. each blood bank will work with at least 15 volunteers

1. at least 10 volunteers will contribute to the planning of the campaigns i.e. promote the campaigns and help raise funds)
2. each branch of the project will share at least 8 calls for blood donors if they receive messages from patients’ relatives

Methodology:

During the summer months, we contacted music festivals all over the country and partnered with them, hence we were able to offer tickets for 9 events in August and September. Everyone with a proof of a donation was eligible to participate. Both festival organisers and donors showed interest in this sort of activity. In December, between the 5th and the 16th, we organised another campaign in 35 cities in Romania and in the Republic of Moldova. Each project branch (PB) would organise the campaign in 1 to 4 adjacent cities. Each PB designated a “”mini-coordinator”” (MC) for each adjacent city. The MCs would train the nursing students in these cities. There was an increase in the number of cities where our

campaign was held and donors. We started the process of holding presentations about the importance of blood donation in schools and universities in more and more cities, which will definitely have a positive impact on the number of young and new donors in the future.

Plans for evaluation:

Summer Campaign

At least 1000 people reached with every giveaway post and a significant number of young and first time donors participated. We established partnerships with 9 festivals. The positive responses, from organisers, blood bank directors and donors, encourages us to look for even more possible partners for a future edition in 2023.

Winter Campaign

In order to determine the impact of the blood donation campaign that we organised, we asked the head of each blood bank to give us an estimate of the number of donors in a regular week. We compared the number of donors in our campaign to the number we were communicated: 40% increase, 31 blood banks registered a higher number of donors and 3 showed no significant difference. Volunteers and blood bank directors alike were satisfied with our activity and are eager to organise even more events together.

External collaborations:

– Music festivals: We Love Music Vâlcea, IntenCity Craiova, Way Too Far Rock Festival Bistrita, Open Air Blues Därmänesti, Flight Festival Timisoara, Fall In Love Festival Mogosoaia, Magnetic Festival Timisoara, Sighisoara Blues Festival.

– National Blood Transfusion Center

– We managed to fund our campaign by winning a grant called Start ONG, which is a programme launched by Kaufland Romania and implemented by the Act for Tomorrow Association