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Effect of lactation counselling among Bangladeshi women.
– Reported, January 24, 2013
Vitamin A supplementation of mothers postpartum may improve infant health, not only by increasing vitamin A delivery to the infant through breast milk but also by increasing delivery of milk immune factors. Our hypothesis was that postpartum supplementation with vitamin A increases milk concentrations of certain soluble immune factors.
There is compelling evidence that breastfeeding is associated with optimal infant growth and protection from diarrhea, respiratory infections, and other illnesses.However, some lactating women experience breastfeeding difficulties that may lead to early cessation of breastfeeding or introduction of complementary feeding before the recommended 6 months.Subclinical mastitis (SCM) is an inflammatory condition of the lactating breast that is thought to be caused by milk stasis or infections and has been associated with elevated risk of lactation failure and poor infant weight gain.
Subclinical mastitis, defined as raised milk sodium/potassium (Na/K) in the absence of clinical symptoms, is associated with poor infant weight gain and increased risk of mother-to-child HIV transmission. Similarly to clinical mastitis, subclinical mastitis appears to have multiple causes, one being poor lactation practice. We investigated whether a single session of lactation counselling around the time of delivery could decrease subclinical mastitis among women in rural Bangladesh. The counselling messages included the importance of giving colostrum, exclusive breastfeeding, feeding on demand and how to achieve good positioning and attachment. Women who had delivered prior to our instituting the counselling intervention (mean 1 month) constituted the uncounselled group.
Postpartum vitamin A supplementation does not increase milk concentrations of immune factors. The causes of increased mammary epithelial permeability in this population require further study.
The results show that among Bangladeshi women a simple lactation counselling intervention could improve lactation practice in ways likely to improve infant health.
CREDITS:
Flores, Maria; Filteau, Suzanne
http://www.ingentaconnect.com
Suzanne M Filteau, Amy L Rice, Jennifer J Ball, J Chakraborty, Rebecca Stoltzfus, Andres de Francisco, and Juana F Willumsen
http://ajcn.nutrition.org/
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