COW’S MILK INTRODUCTION IN SPANISH INFANTS

COW’S MILK INTRODUCTION IN SPANISH INFANTS

Santamaria-Orleans A

, Miranda-León MT

, Rivero-Urgell M

, Campoy-Folgoso C

1

Scientific Department, Laboratorios Ordesa, Barcelona, Spain;

B iostatistics Department, University of Granada, Spain;

Pediatrics Department, University of o Granada, Spain.

Background/aims: Cow’s milk introduction in infant feeding is not recommended before 12 months of life. Although all paediatric services give parents information in this way, a significant percentage of parents introduce cow’s milk in their infant’s feeding too soon. The aim of this study was to evaluate the age of cow’s milk introduction in Spanish infants and to compare it with Spanish guidelines.

Methods: A total of 926 mothers with infants from 1 to 4 years old took part in this survey. The questionnaire had a retrospective design and was divided in three major parts: Demographic variables, breastfeeding practices and age of introduction of different food during weaning period and semi-quantitative dietary data of their younger infant. The mean age of mothers in the study was 33,7 (SD4,5) years and the mean age of infants 2,4 ( 0,9)years. The study comprised 508 male and 419 female infants. Statistic analysis: ANOVA and correlation test were done using the computer program SPSS 11.0. A p-value of less than 0,05 was adopted as criteria of significance and 95% confidence intervals were used.

Results: The mean age of cow’s milk introduction was 17,0 (5,6) months.

34,5% of infants began to take cow’s milk at 12 months of life or before. 65% of k infants introduce growth milks, cow’s milks specially adapted to toddlers, enriched with vitamins and minerals and with a low protein content and vegetal fat, before standard cow’s milk. 58,3% of infants began to take growth milks at f 12 months of life or before. Age of cow’s milk introduction was not related with maternal level of studies, number of children or Spanish geographical region, but it was found a relationship between maternal age and age of cow’s milk introduction (p < 0,05). There were correlations between age of cow’s milk introduction and breastfeeding duration (p< 0,01), age of follow-on formulae (p<0,0001), gluten (p<0,01) and weaning (p<0,05) introduction.

Conclusions: 1) 65,5 % of Spanish infants introduce in their complementary feeding cow milk after 12 months of life, following Spanish paediatric recommendations. 2) Parents must be informed about the similarities between growth milks and cow’s milk and introduce both of them after 12 months of life, 3) Early use of cow’s milk is associated with precocious introduction of wean Key words: Cow milk introduction, weaning, complementary feeding, infant feeding.

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