Pre-birth decisions `affect feeding'
A WOMAN who makes up her mind to breastfeed before her baby is born will almost always succeed.
Latest research shows
96.6% of women who planned to breastfeed for at least four months managed to start breastfeeding. But of women who intended to bottle-feed before birth, only 3.4% started to breastfeed.
"There is mounting evidence of the health benefits of breast-feeding, but many women never attempt it," said Dr Lisa Amir, from the Australian Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children, yesterday.
"A good deal of research has pinpointed factors which may be associated with this, for example, older mothers, non-smokers and those with higher levels of education and income are more likely to breast-feed.
"However, this new re-search indicates that simply making the decision to breast-feed during pregnancy outweighs all these factors combined."
The research also showed that the length of time women breast-fed was largely dictated by the decisions they made before birth. Those who intended to breast-feed for at least four months continued for 4.4 months on average, compared to 2.5 months for women who had intended to breast-feed for only one month.
The World Health Organ-isation recommends a mother breast-feeds exclusively for at least six months to reap the health benefits. Formula-fed babies run a higher risk of suffering ear and chest infections, juvenile diabetes, gastroenteritis, obesity and orthodontic problems.
Almost seven out of 10 mothers in Wales start breast-feeding on the birth of their child, but this falls to four out of 10 within six weeks, then two out of 10 within six months. One in 10 of all mothers wish they could have breast-fed longer.
But pregnant women and mothers-to-be are often put off because they feel embarrassed or feeds become too painful, say experts.
Heather Neil, breastfeeding counsellor and tutor with the National Childbirth Trust, says this is the result of conflicting advice, but she praised a two-year-old National Assembly strategy to reverse the trend.
"In the first few weeks a mother is in quite close contact with health visitors and midwives and reliant on them to get the best breast-feeding information. If training is inadequate, professionals are not able to give the advice.
"If the baby is not growing very well the first bit of advice is to give a baby a bottle but it may be about improving breast-feeding, adjusting position so a baby feeds more effectively or more often."