Energy content of milk from nursing mothers of premature infants and its relationship with caloric intake and maternal sociodemographic characteristics/ Conteúdo energético do leite de nutrizes de lactentes prematuros e sua relação com a ingestão calórica e com características sociodemográficas maternas

Abstract

Aim: To evaluate the energy content of milk of nursing mothers of premature infants and identify whether there is association with caloric intake and maternal sociodemographic variables. Methods: analytical, cross-sectional study with milk donated by 18 nursing mothers of premature infants admitted to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit of the National Institute of Woman, Child and Adolescent Health - IFF/Fiocruz. The energy content of breast milk was evaluated by crematocrit, by the human milk bank. To assess maternal food consumption, the Food Frequency Questionnaire was used and sociodemographic data were obtained from interviews with the nursing mothers. Data were evaluated using the SPSS 22.0 software.Results: It was found that 89% of the milk collected was normocaloric, with an average energy content of 597.2 ± 79.1 kcal/L and that most of the milk expressed was colostrum. The average caloric intake of the nursing mothers was 2554 ± 413.1 kcal/day and the consumption of polyunsaturated fats, which corresponded to 3.5% of the total energy intake, was below the recommendation. There was no association between the energy content of human milk and the studied variables, but there was a tendency for nursing mothers living outside the city of Rio de Janeiro to have a higher caloric content in milk (p = 0.06).Conclusion: The human milk samples were normocaloric, maternal food consumption was inadequate for polyunsaturated fats and there was no association of sociodemographic variables or maternal caloric intake with the energy content of human milk.