Prevalence and determinants of exclusive breastfeeding in Jordan :a secondary data analysis of the Jordanian demographic and health Survey 2012 -

Abstract

Exclusive breastfeeding is a major public health issue and has critical importance and benefits for both women’s and babies health. Exclusive breastfeeding is promoted by the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF, in addition to being one of the main targets included within the Millennium Development Goals.This study explored and analyzed the prevalence and determinants of exclusive breastfeeding among a national representative sample of 1009 ever married women 15- 49 years of age who had babies aged between 0-6 months using the latest data of the Jordanian Population and Health Survey of 2012.Secondary data analysis was conducted on the Jordanian data to examine the strength of association between our main outcome of interest which is whether women exclusively breastfed their babies or not by asking them about the food intake in the last 24 hours prior to survey and a number of independent variables. The independent variables included: women’s age, area of residence of women, parity, household economic status, women’s working status, women’s education, age, sex and birth weight of the babies, hospital practices, place and mode of delivery, utilization of antenatal care clinics and smoking (nargileh and-or cigarettes). Univariate analysis of babies between 0-6 months was conducted according to the women’s characteristics. Bivariate analysis was used to test the association between each independent variable and our outcome of interest which is exclusive breastfeeding. In the bivariate analysis two by two tables and logistic regression were used. Variables that are found significant at the bivariate level were included in the multivariate level, by taking into consideration not to include two strongly correlated independent variables. In the multivariate analysis logistic regression were used. Unadjusted and adjusted odds ratios as well as p-values, 95percent and 90percent confidence intervals were calculated and reported.The results of this study showed that exclusive breastfeeding has been