This study aims to assess the motivations of patients’ next-of-kin (NOK) in deciding to donate their NOK’s cornea, their knowledge, and attitudes on corneal donation (CD) practices in Singapore, and recommendations for public education on CD. 100 NOK of deceased patients in a tertiary hospital in Singapore were invited to complete a cross-sectional questionnaire-based study. Demographical data collected include age, religion, and educational qualifications, as well as their decision to donate. 22 participants (45.5% female) were willing to donate their NOK’s cornea. 77 (53.2% female) were unwilling. 1 did not answer. The top cited reason for willingness to donate was “wanting to perform a good deed” (n=20) while the “desire to keep their NOK’s body intact” (n=42) was the most cited reason for being unwilling. Knowledge (range, 0-12) on CD (4.48 ±2.83) and Human Organ Transplant Act (HOTA) (0.495 ±1.02 respectively) was poor across most participants. Older participants were more willing to donate (34.21% vs 15.25%), despite similar understanding on CD (4.89 ±2.09 vs 4.19 ±1.92, p=0.093). Hindus (n=3, 25%) and Muslims (n=0) were most and least willing to donate respectively. Recommended educational platforms for CD included public forms (n=98) and social media awareness programmes (n=98). In conclusion, age and religion are strong factors affecting decisions to donate, even with similar knowledge levels. Understanding how such factors interact can assist in curating educational platform for CD.

Au Wei Yung is embarking on his MBBS degree at the age of 23 years from Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine, Nanyang Technological University Singapore. As an aspiring ophthalmologist, he has assumed multiple portfolios to expose himself to clinical ophthalmology and research. He is the Chairperson of the Ophthalmology Student Interest Group and has worked on papers ranging from Glaucoma AI App and LLM Chatbots to KAP studies on corneal donation.