Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/1893/18368
Appears in Collections:Faculty of Health Sciences and Sport Journal Articles
Peer Review Status: Refereed
Title: The effectiveness of proactive telephone support provided to breastfeeding mothers of preterm infants: Study protocol for a randomized controlled trial
Author(s): Ericson, Jenny
Eriksson, Mats
Hellstrom-Westas, Lena
Hagberg, Lars
Hoddinott, Pat
Flacking, Renee
Contact Email: p.m.hoddinott@stir.ac.uk
Keywords: Breastfeeding
Mothers
Neonatal care
Preterm infant
Support
Telephone
Issue Date: 10-May-2013
Date Deposited: 20-Jan-2014
Citation: Ericson J, Eriksson M, Hellstrom-Westas L, Hagberg L, Hoddinott P & Flacking R (2013) The effectiveness of proactive telephone support provided to breastfeeding mothers of preterm infants: Study protocol for a randomized controlled trial. BMC Pediatrics, 13 (1), Art. No.: 73. https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2431-13-73
Abstract: Background: Although breast milk has numerous benefits for infants' development, with greater effects in those born preterm (at < 37 gestational weeks), mothers of preterm infants have shorter breastfeeding duration than mothers of term infants. One of the explanations proposed is the difficulties in the transition from a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) to the home environment. A person-centred proactive telephone support intervention after discharge from NICU is expected to promote mothers' sense of trust in their own capacity and thereby facilitate breastfeeding. Methods/design: A multicentre randomized controlled trial has been designed to evaluate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of person-centred proactive telephone support on breastfeeding outcomes for mothers of preterm infants. Participating mothers will be randomized to either an intervention group or control group. In the intervention group person-centred proactive telephone support will be provided, in which the support team phones the mother daily for up to 14 days after hospital discharge. In the control group, mothers are offered a person-centred reactive support where mothers can phone the breastfeeding support team up to day 14 after hospital discharge. The intervention group will also be offered the same reactive telephone support as the control group. A stratified block randomization will be used; group allocation will be by high or low socioeconomic status and by NICU. Recruitment will be performed continuously until 1116 mothers (I: 558 C: 558) have been included. Primary outcome: proportion of mothers exclusively breastfeeding at eight weeks after discharge. Secondary outcomes: proportion of breastfeeding (exclusive, partial, none and method of feeding), mothers satisfaction with breastfeeding, attachment, stress and quality of life in mothers/partners at eight weeks after hospital discharge and at six months postnatal age. Data will be collected by researchers blind to group allocation for the primary outcome. A qualitative evaluation of experiences of receiving/providing the intervention will also be undertaken with mothers and staff. Discussion: This paper presents the rationale, study design and protocol for a RCT providing person-centred proactive telephone support to mothers of preterm infants. Furthermore, with a health economic evaluation, the cost-effectiveness of the intervention will be assessed.
DOI Link: 10.1186/1471-2431-13-73
Rights: © 2013 Ericson et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Licence URL(s): http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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