ABSTRACT

Infant nutrition is an integral part of infant health. Infant feeding practices are feeding options and activities undertaken by mothers/caregivers to meet the infant’s nutritional needs. Optimal Infant Feeding Practices recommended by World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) involves early initiation of breastfeeding, exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6months of life, followed by adequate complementary feeding and continued breastfeeding until the child is at least two years old. This study assessed the knowledge, attitude and practice of infant feeding in association with their anthropometric indices in Awka, Awka south local government area of Anambra State. A cross sectional descriptive survey design was adopted. The population of the study were all the mothers with 0-12 Months old infants. Data collection was done using a closed ended questionnaire. Recumbent length was measured using an infantometer and reading was taken to the nearest 0.1cm. Weight was taken using bathroom weighing scale and measurement was taken to the nearest 0.1kg. WHO-Anthro was used to assess the anthropometric status (Z-score) of the infant. In the classification of the knowledge questions correct response was assigned the value of one while zero was given to the wrong responses. In the classification of the knowledge questions correct response was assigned the value of one while zero was given to the wrong responses. The knowledge and attitude score was derived from the summation of the individual question scores while the percentage knowledge score was obtained by dividing the knowledge score by the number of knowledge items. Knowledge was graded thus: poor knowledge (≤ 39.9), fair knowledge (40.0-69.9) while good knowledge (≥ 70.0). Descriptive statistics (frequency and percentage, mean and standard deviation) were used to analyze the personal and socio-economic characteristics of the respondents, infants feeding practices among mothers, knowledge of mothers on breastfeeding and continued breastfeeding. Significant difference was judged at p<0.05. The result revealed that many of the nursing mothers (65.5%) who participated in the study had good knowledge on practice of breastfeeding and continued breastfeeding at one year. Few infants (30%) received adequately diversified foods during their weaning period, stunting and underweight were found to be prevalent among few infants (10.3% and 1.8%) involved in this study. Thus it concludes that although the knowledge of many of the mothers were good, some of the mothers practice early ceasation of breastmilk, early as well as late introduction of complementary foods which are most times nutritionally inadequate. The study recommends that sensitization and awareness creation during antenatal and post natal periods should be sustained through multi-sectoral efforts.