The knowledge and attitude of maternal diet and infant allergy prevention among breastfeeding peer counsellors in Pahang

• Main Authors: Mahasan, Ainun Syuhada, Abdul Ghani, Radiah
• Format: Conference or Workshop Item
• Language: English
• Published: 2021
• Subjects: RA0421 Public health. Hygiene. Preventive Medicine
• Online Access: http://irep.iium.edu.my/94011/1/94011_The%20Knowledge%20and%20Attitude%20of%20Maternal%20Diet_new.pdf; http://irep.iium.edu.my/94011/

Introduction / Background: Allergy among children is a growing public health concern worldwide. Even though breastfeeding was scientifically proven to be beneficial, the prevalence of allergy among exclusively-breastfed infants is also on the rise. Breastfeeding Peer Counsellors (BPC) with favourable knowledge and attitude on maternal diet modulation and allergy prevention may assist mothers to prevent allergy among breastfed infants. Objectives: This study aimed to determine changes in knowledge and attitude following an intervention using a module regarding maternal diet and allergy among BPC in Pahang. Methodology: This is an interventional study using validated module on maternal diet and allergy involving 72 BPCs who were conveniently sampled from 11 districts in Pahang. Respondents’ pre- and post-intervention knowledge and attitude on maternal diet and allergy were measured using a validated self-administered questionnaire. Results: Based on post-evaluation, majority of BPC (51.4%) had good level of knowledge on maternal diet and allergy. There was a significant improvement of positive attitude towards maternal diet and allergy from 44.4% for pre-intervention to 61.1% for post-intervention. The result also shows a significant moderate-good correlation between knowledge and attitude for both pre- and post-intervention (r=0.668, p<0.001) and (r=0.547, p<0.001) respectively. Conclusion: The re-education on maternal diet and allergy using intervention modules showed to be good strategy to improve the knowledge and attitude of BPC for allergy prevention among breastfed infants. It is hoped that the BPC will be more equipped and the knowledge can be transferred to breastfed mothers in order to reduce the potential risk of allergy among breastfed infants.