KNOWLEDGE AND PRACTICES OF EXCLUSIVE BREASTFEEDING AND COMPLEMENTARY FEEDING AMONG MOTHERS ALONG WITH NEWBORN CARE IN A RURAL AREA OF COX’S BAZAR DISTRICT IN BANGLADESH

Abstract

One of the essential elements in a child’s survival, birth spacing and ability to avoid illness is Breastfeeding. This study was conducted to evaluate the knowledge and practices of exclusive breastfeeding and complementary feeding among rural mothers and identified the factors that influence feeding practices and knowledge. For this study, about 350 number of mother-child pairs have been purposively selected from kauerkhope union, ramu upazila of Cox's Bazar district, Bangladesh by a pre-designed questionnaire. The features in this study have been determined by using cross-sectional descriptive analysis for identifying general characteristics, correlations between independent variables (Age in years, educational qualification, occupation of mothers, family income, religion, types of family, no. of children and place of delivery) and dependent variables (knowledge and practices of EBF and CF) and logistic regression with a p-value of <0.05. Nutritional status is determined by anthropometry methods. The prevalence of knowledge and practices of EBF has been found about 63.7% and 68.3% respectively whereas the prevalence of knowledge and practices of CF has been found about 68.3% and 46.9% respectively. From the binomial logistics regression analysis, Mothers who have primary and secondary educational qualification (adjusted odds ratio, (AOR)=6.966 and 2.632; 95% confidence interval, (CI):2.660-18.240 and 1.596-4.341) have shown good EBF practice than others. On the other side, Mothers who have secondary & higher-level educational qualification (adjusted odds ratio, (AOR)=13.649; 95% CI:1.937-12.383) and who also have chosen house as delivery place (AOR=6.803; 95% CI: 2.803 - 14.551) are more likely to have good practice of CF compared to their counterparts. There have been only 54.9% mothers who have completed ANC visit during previous pregnancy period. In comparison, 64.9% mothers do not attend any PNC visit after delivery and rural mothers are more likely to choose house as delivery place. Around 21% children have eaten the right amount of food according to their age. Finally, 8.1% malnourished has been found in this study. So, it is recommended that, to reduce health disparities, community health extension activities should be strengthened with nutritional health educators.