Situation of breastfeeding and complementary feeding in a medium-sized municipality in the Ribeira Valley, São Paulo

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the situation of breastfeeding and complementary feeding in the city of Registro, São Paulo. METHODS: This cross-sectional study collected sociodemographic and feeding information of infants aged less than one year who participated in the 2011 multiple vaccine campaign. Breastfeeding and complementary feeding were analyzed by indicators proposed by the World Health Organization. The association between outcomes (exclusive breastfeeding and introduction to complementary feeding) and the explanatory variables (maternal and child characteristics) was investigated by the Poisson model with a robust error variance. RESULTS: We analyzed 713 children. The prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding was 50.0%. Children who were breastfed exclusively on the first day at home (PR=2.40; 95%CI=1.42-4.06) and not given pacifiers (PR=1.95; 95%CI=1.153.30) were more likely to be exclusively breastfed. The complementary feeding indicators showed that 62.1% of the children aged 6 to 8.9 months consumed fruit plus savory mashes. None of the explanatory variables was significantly associated with this outcome. CONCLUSION: The study identified inappropriate infant feeding practices. Such studies can contribute to the proposal of policies, which is particularly important in an unfavorable social development context characterized by the study city.