Mother and Neonate Skin-to-Skin Contact and Exclusive Breastfeeding in the first two months of life: Clinical Trial

Background: Breast milk is the best nutrition and the most valuable gift that every mother offers to her neonate. Exclusive breastfeeding is the best method to feed an infant. Mother and neonate skin-to-skin contact is an effective manner to increase it.  Aim of this study was to investigate the effect of skin-to-skin contact education between mother and infant on the amount of exclusive breastfeeding during the first two months of life. Method: 250 mothers who had a 3 to 5 day-old baby and referred to the Walfajr Clinic for care were classified as a randomized clinical trial study in two groups of 125 interventions and controls. The intervention group educated for skin-to-skin contact. Exclusive breastfeeding, weight, height, head circumference of neonate, infantchr(chr(chr('39')39chr('39'))39chr(chr('39')39chr('39')))s sleep and crying.and maternal quality of life at baseline and two months later were compared. The main variable, which was exclusive breastfeeding, was measured through a checklist. Significant levels of less than 0.05 were considered. Finding: The rate of exclusive breastfeeding (p=0.0001), infantchr(chr(chr('39')39chr('39'))39chr(chr('39')39chr('39')))s crying (p = 0.018) and sleep rate (p=0.025), motherchr(chr(chr('39')39chr('39'))39chr(chr('39')39chr('39')))s quality of life two months later (p = 0.013) had a significant difference between the two groups. Conclusion: Skin-to-skin contact education to mothers and doing it during the first two months of life by them has a significant effect on increasing exclusive breastfeeding, improving the quality of life of mothers, increasing sleep and reducing infant crying in the first two months of life.  Keywords: skin-to-skin contact, exclusive breastfeeding, quality of life, crying rate, sleep rate