A Survey of Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices of Providers and Staff at Al-Zahraa University Hospital Regarding the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative and the International Code of Marketing Breast Milk Substitutes.

Four hundred eight providers and staff members who care for breastfeeding mothers and babies at Al-Zahraa University Hospital, Cairo, Egypt were randomly selected to assess their knowledge, attitudes, and practices regarding the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative. The majority of the participants scored above 50% on the knowledge and attitude questions, however, on the practice questions only 45.3% scored above 50%, similar to the result obtained 10 years prior. The results indicate that most attention should be focused on developing practice guidelines and monitoring outcomes since knowledge and attitude were found to be adequate. We would recommend self-appraisal of staff as a first step to others whose hospitals are in the process of implementing the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative.

Evaluation of mothers' knowledge, attitudes, and practice towards the ten steps to successful breastfeeding in Egypt.

BACKGROUND: Despite the proven effectiveness of the Ten Steps to Successful Breastfeeding of the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative (BFHI), its impact on community practices in Egypt has yet to be assessed. The aim of this investigation was to evaluate the knowledge, attitudes, and practice (KAP) of Egyptian mothers towards the Ten Steps. We interviewed 1,052 breastfeeding mothers with infants less than 24 months of age from 12 governorates representing Upper Egypt (UE) and Lower Egypt (LE). RESULTS: Marked regional variations are noted in the KAP of the samples from UE and LE. These differences can be explained to some extent by socioeconomic factors. Hospital delivery, lower parity, and a higher level of education were characteristic of mothers in LE compared with UE. More mothers in UE did not know about the protective effects of breastfeeding to the mother. In LE, 75% delayed breastfeeding initiation until after the first hour compared with 61% in UE, with the mothers reporting that they did not experience skin-to-skin care in the first hours after birth. Nipple pain was given as a cause for supplementation in 56% of mothers in UE and 36% in LE (p<0.001). Maintaining milk by expression is practiced by 42.8% of mothers in LE and 12% in UE. Two-thirds of the mothers in both UE and LE offer herbal drinks, and one-third feed infant milk formula before 6 months. Offering pacifiers is more common in LE, and feeding by bottle is more common in UE, being pressured by the mother's social network. CONCLUSIONS: To increase the impact of BFHI on community breastfeeding practices, BFHI should focus on involving the family members with the mother throughout the implementation of the Ten Steps while encouraging maternal support groups and taking cultural differences into account.

The effect of kangaroo mother care on the duration of phototherapy of infants re-admitted for neonatal jaundice.

OBJECTIVE: We investigated the effect of kangaroo mother care (KMC) on the duration of phototherapy of jaundiced neonates. METHODS: Fifty Egyptian newborns hospitalized for jaundice were investigated through a prospective observational study to determine whether intermittent KMC would reduce the duration of phototherapy required. RESULTS: The babies who received KMC recovered earlier from jaundice and needed a shorter duration of phototherapy than the control group (68.14 ± 24.32 hour versus 100.86 ± 42.26 hour, p = 0.004). CONCLUSION: KMC may be an effective intervention to reduce the duration of phototherapy needed when jaundiced babies are hospitalized.