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Breastfeeding

Definition

This topic refers to breastfeeding and focuses on duration of breastfeeding and ages at which foods other than breast milk were introduced into the infant's regular diet.

Population

Information was collected for children aged 0-3 years (that is, children up to 3 years and 11 months of age, also referred to as 0-47 months) in the 2017-18 NHS.

Guidelines

The World Health Organisation and National Health and Medical Research Council infant feeding guidelines recommend exclusive breastfeeding until around 6 months of age. Exclusive breastfeeding is defined as feeding the child only breast milk. This can include milk expressed from the mother, from a wet nurse or from a breast milk donor.

Methodology

The following questions were designed to enable measurement of breastfeeding, including exclusive breastfeeding.

The child's proxy (preferably, but not necessarily, the child's mother) was initially asked if the child had ever received breast milk.

If yes, the proxy was asked whether the child was currently receiving breast milk.

For those children currently receiving breast milk, the proxy was asked:

• Whether the child had ever had any food or drink other than breast milk (to determine whether the child is 'exclusively' breastfed)
  The following examples of other food or drink were provided on a prompt card:
  • Infant formula products
  • Soft or semi-soft foods (baby food)
  • Biscuits
  • Water
  • Cow's milk
  • Goat's milk
  • Soy milk
  • Other cereal based milks - Oat, rice, almond etc.
  • Yoghurt based food or drink
  • Cordial (water based drinks) or soft drink
  • Fruit juice
  • Tea or coffee
  
  
• If yes, what was the age the child first had any food or drink other than breast milk (to determine how old the child was when any other sustenance/nutrition was introduced to their diet, i.e. liquids (drink) and foods).

• The age the child stopped receiving any breast milk (to establish how long (in months) the child received any breast milk, in order to assess against the guidelines)
• The age the child first had any food or drink other than breast milk. No prompt card was used, however 'including water, formula, and juice' was included in the question.

• Accuracy of the data may be affected in cases where an adult other than the child's parent responded for the child.
• An age group of '0-5 months' is used to describe children aged up to 5 months and 30 days, including just under 6 months.
• In NHS 2017-18 and 2014-15 there were some inconsistencies between responses to the question on 'Age stopped receiving any breast milk (CHBRSR)' and the 'Age at which any food other than breast milk was introduced'. The data in the NHS 2017-18 Breastfeeding Commentary and Datacubes has restricted the item 'Age exclusively breastfed until (EXBRSTFD)' such that it cannot be greater than the age stopped receiving any breast milk. It also includes revised data for NHS 2014-15 on this basis. This restriction makes a minor adjustment to the estimates previously supplied, but is not significant.
  
  For example, exclusively breastfed for 6 months is defined as:
  • 'Age stopped receiving any breast milk' = 6-47 months or 'Still receiving breast milk' AND
  • 'Age exclusively breastfed until' = 6-47 months