Effectiveness of timed and targeted counselling about feeding and caring practices for infants and young children to mothers in West Bank: a randomized controlled trial

On August 2017, Hana Al-Rabadi and Nuha El Sharif published a new study in The Lancet titled " Effectiveness of timed and targeted counselling about feeding and caring practices for infants and young children to mothers in West Bank: a randomised controlled trial"

The article aimed to assess the effectiveness of a community approach called Timed Targeted Counselling in improving mothers' knowledge and practices of IYCF in four remote villages surrounding Bethlehem in the West Bank.

The results of this study demonstrated that the enrolled 118 mothers in the study and randomly assigned them to the intervention group (n=66) or the comparison group (n=52). IYCF and caring practices improved significantly among mothers in the intervention group: exclusive breastfeeding up to 6 months increased from 27% (18 of 66 women) to 70% (46 women; OR 29, 95% CI 8·02–108); breastfeeding of children aged 1 year increased from 56% (37) to 83% (55; 2·94, 1·03–8·41); timely introduction of complementary meals increased from 38·5% (25) to 67% (44; 83·6, 17·24–40·5); rubbing of salt on infant skin and umbilical cord decreased from 54·5% (36) to 3% (3; 0·033, 0·006–0·19); recognition of danger signs increased from 15% (10) to 48% (32; 3·96, 0·17–9·2); and, bathing of newborns within 24 h after birth decreased from 68·2% (45) to 32% (21; p<0·0001 for all comparisons). No behavioral changes were recorded among mothers in the comparison group. During the study period, fewer disease episodes were reported in the intervention group than in the comparison group for diarrhea (10 cases vs 25 cases), respiratory illness (15 vs 33), common cold (39 vs 50), fever (20 vs 31), and ear infections (7 vs 32 cases).

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