Trends in Exclusive Breastfeeding Practices and Factors Affecting Mothers in Suburbs of Lahore

Breast feeding has no match as a nutritional resource during the first six months for an infant,necessary for the health of both mother and infant. In past, Pakistan had worst breast feeding rates and despiteefforts to promote breast feeding, situation is not satisfactory. Aims & Objectives: Our aim was to determinethe frequency of mothers having exclusive breast feeding practices and finding various factors which mayaffect trends of exclusive breast feeding practices, in rural areas of Lahore. Place and duration of study:This study was done during May 2018 to October 2018 at Chaudhary Muhammad Akram Teaching Hospital.Material & Methods: In this cross sectional study, 254 mothers were interviewed directly and predesignedquestionnaire was filled, through non probability consecutive sampling. Data was analyzed using SPSS 20.Post stratification chi square test was applied. Results: Only 34.3 percent mothers were found to practiceexclusive breast feed till 6 months of infant age, 93 percent mothers were of age<35 years, mean age 26.6years and SD±4.9. Only 3.5% initiate breast feeding within an hour of birth. Chi square test revealedassociation between exclusive breast feed with insufficient breast milk, initiation time of breast feed and earlycessation of breast feed (p<0.05). Conclusion: Declining rates of breast feeding creates an alarming situationand suggests to make more aggressive efforts for promotion of breast feeding the infants.Key words: breast feed, insufficient feed, prlecteal feed