India is struggling from acute shortage of organs for transplantation. Though the number of transplants performed in India are steadily increasing, there is wide gap between need and availability of organs in India. To improve the attitude towards the organ donation, it's imperative that youth of country is appropriately educated and made aware so that eventually goals for higher donation rates could be achieved. Health science students are the ones who work in close proximity the community.

To assess the knowledge and attitude regarding organ transplant amongst health science students and the factors affecting it.

The study was conducted among students from various courses studying at Topiwala National Medical college and B.Y.L Nair charitable hospital situated in Mumbai. 387 students from various courses were selected by stratified random sampling. A semi structured questionnaire was prepared in line with the objectives of the study which consisted of questions on knowledge and attitude regarding organ donation. A suitable time slot was decided in consultation with the batch representative and the questionnaire was self-administered to all selected students after obtaining informed consent. Data was analyzed using appropriate statistical tests.

98.7% students were aware about organ donation but only 263 (68%) were aware about live as well as cadaveric donation. The knowledge attitude and practice score were calculated and mean scores were found to be 6.67±1.59, 2.68±0.65 and 2.93±0.88 respectively. The male students had significantly higher knowledge, attitude and perception scores. The mean knowledge, attitude and practice scores increase with increasing age and coarse year.

The study emphasizes on the need of inclusion of organ donation in curriculum of all courses which would develop a positive attitude about organ donation which in the long run will bridge the gap between demand and supply.