Knowledge over mother`s breastfeeding attended by the children clinic in Cáceres city, Mato Grosso, Brazil

Objectives: characterize the studied population about the social demographics factors and verify the mother`s knowledge on breastfeeding. Method: this is about a transversal, prospective and descriptive study with mother`s attended by the Children Clinic in Cáceres/MT where a semi-structured interview questionnaire was applied containing dada of social demographic characterization and questions over breastfeeding; the work was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Cuiaba University, under the registration number 126/2009. To analyze the results the categorical variables and the variables on the mother`s knowledge were described using taxes, proportion and raw numbers. Results: 56% were over 24 years old, 46% had only basic education, 73% were housewives, 46% were primigravidae and among the multigravidae almost all of them had breastfed earlier children for a period equal or superior to six months. All of them gave satisfactory answers about the ideal period and benefits of breastfeeding. Conclusion: it is concluded that the mothers had an adequate knowledge over the benefits that breastfeeding has over the development and growth of health children and for the mother`s health, even though they are young and primigravidae; low schooling of the mothers, isolated, it can`t be associated to the breastfeeding flaws. It was not possible to associate the level of knowledge with breastfeeding flaws. There were flaws during the prenatal relating to the thematic approach by health professionals. Descriptors: knowledge; breastfeeding; prenatal care.RESUMOObjetivos: caracterizar a população estudada quanto aos fatores sócio-demográficos e descrever o conhecimento de puérperas sobre aleitamento materno. Método: estudo transversal, prospectivo e descritivo com vinte e seis puérperas atendidas no Ambulatório da Criança em Cáceres/MT onde se aplicou um formulário de entrevista semi-estruturada contendo dados de caracterização sócio-demográfica e questões sobre aleitamento materno; o trabalho foi aprovado pelo ...