Infant Feeding Practices in an Urban Area of Amritsar, Punjab

Globally, breast feeding has the potential to prevent about 800,000 deaths among children under five each years if all children 0-23 months were optimally breastfed. Early initiation of breast feeding could prevent about one fifth of neonatal deaths, but less than half of infants are put to the breast within one hour of birth. So the present study was planned to know the breast feeding practices and the sociodemographic factors influencing the feeding practices among the mothers of one year old children. A community based cross sectional study was conducted in the urban field practice area of the Department of Community Medicine of SGRD Institute of Medical Sciences and Research among the mothers having less than one year old child. There were total recorded 263 mothers having less than one year old child. Information about demographic profile, breast feeding practices and socio cultural factors affecting the feeding practices was collected using a pre-tested and predesigned proforma. Out of total 257 mothers were willing to participate in the study. Statistical analysis was done by using SPSS 20.0. It was observed that 53.7% mothers started breast feeding next day, 30.4% mothers started breast feeding the same day and 16% started breast feeding immediately. Prelacteal feed was given by 89.5% mothers. The common prelacteal feed given was honey (67.3%) followed by sugar in water (14.0%), jaggery (12.8%) and others (5.8%). Colostrum was given by 59.1% of mothers. The study shows that cultural practices such as giving prelacteal feed, discarding colostrums and late initiation of breast feeding are still prevalent in the community. These should be discouraged by providing health education and through BCC activities.