Health Education Enhances The Understanding Of Pregnant Women Towards The Prevention Of Early Complementary Feeding

Abstract

Objective: Starting to provide complementary foods at the right time is very beneficial for meeting nutritional needs and for baby's growth and development. The provision of complementary foods depends on the mother's knowledge and attitude. Health education is a way to increase understanding and readiness of mothers in efforts to prevent early introduction of complementary feeding to babies. The research objective was to analyze the effect of health education with leaflets on early complementary feeding attitudes in third trimester pregnant women. Methods: The research design was a quasi-experimental study with two group pre-post test design, with a sample of 66 third trimester pregnant women who were taken by consecutive sampling. Results: The results showed that there were significant differences in maternal attitudes before and after the provision of health education related to early complementary feeding attitudes (p value <0.001; α = 0.05). Conclusions: This study recommends the implementation of health education about complementary foods for mothers during exclusive breastfeeding as a preventive strategy for early introduction of complementary feeding and to increase the readiness of mothers before the complementary feeding period.