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KNOWLEDGE, ATTITUDES AND PRACTICES TOWARDS BREAST FEEDING AMONG MOTHERS WITH INFANTS AT KASANA HC IV, LUWEERO DITRICT
Background: Globally, infant breast feeding is well recognized since ancient ages as the best feeding method for infants because of its associated benefits including providing immunologic protection against death from infectious diseases, such as diarrhoea, respiratory infections, otitis media, among others. Despite this relevance, breastfeeding rates among women with infants has been stagnated with global statistics indicating that only 45% of new borne are put to the breast within the first hour of birth, and roughly the same proportion of infants less than 1 year of age are exclusively breastfed. In Uganda, available statistics estimate that the current death toll of 141,000 children dying annually could be due to inadequate breastfeeding practices. Therefore, this study sought to determine the knowledge, attitudes and practices among mothers towards breast feeding of infants in Kasana H/C IV, Luweero district. Methods: The study employed a cross sectional research design in which opinions were obtained from 113 mothers although only 80 successfully filled and returned the questionnaires, giving a response rate of 70.8%. These questionnaires were coded, tabulated, analyzed and processed using SPSS ver20 from which findings were derived. Results: The findings indicated that knowledge factors were significant predictors of breastfeeding intent among mothers with infants less than one year whereby mothers who had adequate knowledge on the relevance of exclusive breastfeeding were likely to breastfeed their children for longer before adding food supplements. In relation to attitudes, the study revealed that maternal attitudinal factors such as perception of inadequate support from community members, shyness during breastfeeding especially in public, poor perception of breastfeeding in minimizing family expenses were responsible for their failure to comply with the recommended infant breastfeeding practices. Moreover, the study found out inadequate practices to infant breastfeeding including use of pre-lacteal feeds before the recommended age of the infant, less time of exclusive breastfeeding, and use of food supplements. Conclusion: It can be concluded from the study that knowledge and attitudinal factors are very significant in explaining variations in infant breastfeeding. In the same way, the practices of mothers such as use of pre-lacteal feeds, less time of exclusive breastfeeding and use of food supplements were cited as influential among breastfeeding mothers. Thus, breastfeeding mothers with infants need to pay attention to these factors if they are to maximise the benefits of infant breastfeeding. Recommendations: Based on these findings, the researcher recommended that health workers should ensure dissemination of information to create awareness among mothers on best infant feeding practices especially on issues of frequency of breastfeeding, when to initiate food supplements, benefits and limitations of food supplements. More so, there is need to train midwives on proper customer care skills as this will bridge the gap between mothers and health service providers and this will improve their attitudes.
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