ABSTRACT
Background: The world health organization (WHO) recommends exclusive breast feeding (EBF) for the first six months of life while it is advised to provide adequate and safe complementary foods with breast feeding for up to two years and beyond.Methods: A hospital based cross sectional study was carried out in the immunisation clinic of IGIMS for a period of 6 months from January 2017 to June 2017.A total of 400 mothers were enrolled in the study. Children of Age group 0-12 months were included in the study. Sample size was collected by using convenient sampling from January to June 2017. All mothers who attended our immunization clinic for vaccination of their child and had children less than 12 months of age and who gave verbal consent were included in the study. Mothers were asked to stay after vaccination of their infants to look for any untoward effects of vaccination. Mothers were interviewed by using a semi structured questionnaire after getting a verbal consent from them, All data entry and analyses were carried out using Microsoft Excel and statistical software by descriptive statistics and presented as frequency and percentages.Results: The prevalence of exclusive breast feeding for up to 6 months of age was still low. Male child is having a higher percentage of immunization coverage of about 60%, where as the female child is having about 40%. 36% of the babies were started breastfeeding within one hour and colostrum was given to 40% of them, only 35% of them were on exclusive breast feeding.Conclusions: Use of expressed breast milk was low. The prevalence of EBF for up to 6 months of age was still low as per WHO recommendations. The mother's perception of “insufficient breast milk” was also the main reason for introducing other foods. We should make a strategy by making a guideline for promoting and educating about exclusive breastfeeding within the existing health care system such as the antenatal, after delivery and vaccination clinics.