Effect of early mother-baby close contact over the duration of exclusive breastfeeding

Abstract

This is a prospective study involving ninety-two lactating mother- infant pairs in the first six months of birth. They were followed-up up to six months for various perinatal factors determining the duration of exclusive breastfeeding. Early postpartum mother-baby skin-to-skin contact had a powerful influence (P<0.001) over the duration of exclusive breastfeeding up to 4-6 months and was found to be more significant than early initiation of breastfeeding (P<0.05). Mode of delivery did not have any significant effect (P<0.5) over the duration of exclusive breastfeeding. Thus health care centers can easily adopt a policy to allow few minutes of early postpartum mother-baby skin-to-skin contact and early initiation of breastfeeding to all vaginal as well as caesarian deliveries to promote breastfeeding.