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BREASTFEEDING AND GROWTH OF HEALTHY INFANTS FOLLOWED FROM BIRTH TO 18 MONTHS
Bechiri, L; Kadi, H; Bouldjadj, I; El Hadef Elokki, M; Dahliz, I & Dahel, CC
Abstract
Optimal nutrition and regular growth assessment are essential components of healthcare
for all children in order to detect early problems related to their nutritional status before
they are seriously compromised. The objective of our study was to describe the feeding
and growth of healthy breastfeeding infants (0-18 months) in North East of Algeria. A
prospective and descriptive study of the observational type was conducted, in the service
of maternal and child protection at the public health establishment of Skikda (Algeria).
The population constituted mothers and their infants (1-3 months) who presented for the
first or second immunization visit and were followed up to 18 months. Data were
collected by interviewing mothers using an adapted WHO (2004) questionnaire
according to visits of the Algerian vaccination calendar (1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 9th and 18th
months). Children were monitored for breastfeeding, complementary feeding and
growth. Monitoring growth from birth (1, 3, 4, 5, 9 and 18 months) was done by taking
anthropometric measurements (weight, height and head circumference), the evaluation
of motor development and the calculation of anthropometric growth indices according to
WHO standards (2006, 2007): weight/age (W/A), height/age (H/A), weight/height
(W/H), body mass index/age (BMI/A) and head circumference/age (HC/A). A total of
159 infants were enrolled, including 83 (52.2%) girls, giving a sex ratio of 0.92. From 1
to 5 months, exclusive and predominant breastfeeding did not differ by sex (p>0.05).
Exclusive breastfeeding was observed in 15.7% of infants at the first month versus 7.5%
at 5 months. Predominant breastfeeding increased from 84.3% in the first month to 92.5%
at 5 months, while complementary feeding started from four months. All mothers
continued partial breastfeeding for up to one year. All children had normal motor
development. Weight status (4-18 months) did not differ by sex (p>0.05). At the end of
the study, 5.8% of the infants showed body wasting, lean (4.8%), stunted (2.7%) while
83.8% were within the normal weight range. To improve the nutritional status of
Algerian infants, the promotion of exclusive breastfeeding and management of their diet
is necessary by provision of a diversified complementary diet, which includes all macro
and micronutrients, meets all energy and nutritional needs and teaches them good eating
habits and behaviors.
Keywords
Infants; breastfeeding; weight; height; BMI; monitoring; growth; complementary feeding; Algeria
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