Estimating the prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding with data from household surveys : measurement issues and options

Thomas W. Pullum; Karleen Gribble; Seema Mihrshahi; Bindi Borg

doi:10.3389/fnut.2023.1058134

Estimating the prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding with data from household surveys : measurement issues and options

Thomas W. Pullum, Karleen Gribble, Seema Mihrshahi, Bindi Borg

Western Sydney University

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

The importance of breastfeeding for infant and maternal health is well established. The World Health Organization recommends that all infants be exclusively breastfed until they reach 6 months of age. The standard indicator to measure adherence to this criterion is the percentage of children aged 0–5 months who are currently being exclusively breastfed. This paper proposes supplementary measures that are easily calculated with existing survey data. First, for an accurate assessment of the WHO recommendation, we estimate the percentage of infants who are being exclusively breastfed at the exact age of 6 months. Second, an adjustment is proposed for prelacteal feeding. These two modifications, separately and in combination, are applied to data from 31 low-and middle-income countries that have participated in the Demographic and Health Surveys Program since 2015. There is considerable variation in the effects across countries. The modifications use existing data to provide a more accurate estimate than the standard indicator of the achievement of the exclusive breastfeeding until 6 months recommendation.

Original language	English
Article number	1058134
Number of pages	8
Journal	Frontiers in Nutrition
Volume	10
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.3389/fnut.2023.1058134
Publication status	Published - 2023

Open Access - Access Right Statement

© 2023 Pullum, Gribble, Mihrshahi and Borg. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

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10.3389/fnut.2023.1058134

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abstract = "The importance of breastfeeding for infant and maternal health is well established. The World Health Organization recommends that all infants be exclusively breastfed until they reach 6 months of age. The standard indicator to measure adherence to this criterion is the percentage of children aged 0–5 months who are currently being exclusively breastfed. This paper proposes supplementary measures that are easily calculated with existing survey data. First, for an accurate assessment of the WHO recommendation, we estimate the percentage of infants who are being exclusively breastfed at the exact age of 6 months. Second, an adjustment is proposed for prelacteal feeding. These two modifications, separately and in combination, are applied to data from 31 low-and middle-income countries that have participated in the Demographic and Health Surveys Program since 2015. There is considerable variation in the effects across countries. The modifications use existing data to provide a more accurate estimate than the standard indicator of the achievement of the exclusive breastfeeding until 6 months recommendation.",

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Estimating the prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding with data from household surveys : measurement issues and options

Abstract

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