Milk expression and maternity leave as determinants of breastfeeding among mothers employed in a baby friendly hospital

This study aimed to evaluate breastfeeding behaviors among healthcare professional mothers employed in a hospital which support Baby Friendly Hospital (BFH) Initiative program. Methods: This cross-sectional and descriptive study was performed in Erciyes University Hospital between August 2011 and June 2012. 175 healthcare professional mothers who had 1-5 years old children recruited for the study. Data was collected via a questionnaire which contains 51 questions. The rate of exclusive breastfeeding (EB) was 33.1% among healthcare professional mothers employed in a BFH. The mean of total breastfeeding duration was 13.02±7.53 months. The rates of cesarean delivery and initiation breastfeeding in an hour were 77.7% and 61.7% respectively of the study group. Vaginal delivered mothers’ breastfeeding rates in first one hour (79.5%) were significantly higher than caesarean delivered mothers’ (56.6%) (p