Strengthening Babies Through Mobile Health
Strengthening Babies Through Mobile Health
This study will evaluate whether sending educational and supportive mobile phone text messages to mothers of infants, from babies' day of birth until 6 months of age, increases the rate of exclusive breastfeeding in Roatan, Honduras.
Encouraging and educational text messages and animations were created based on barriers to breastfeeding found during preceding focus groups and a baseline survey. Messages were written in English and translated into Spanish, with back-translation to ensure accuracy. Mothers who plan to or are already breastfeeding will be recruited and invited to participate in the study in the post-partum ward after delivery at Public Hospital Roatán. Written informed consent will be obtained. Three animated videos will be shown to mothers at enrollment providing information regarding breastfeeding technique, breastfeeding encouragement and general breastfeeding information. SMS messages will start at time of enrollment and continue through six months after enrollment. Messages will be delivered through Telerivet, an SMS interactive platform designed to send the educational and motivational messages to mothers' cell phones.
The intervention group will be polled when infants turn two months, four months, and six months regarding their infant feeding practices through Telerivet via SMS messaging. The primary outcome of this study is exclusive breastfeeding at 2 months of age, as compared to the exclusive breastfeeding rate obtained in our baseline cross sectional survey. Exclusive breastfeeding will be defined as giving only mother's breastmilk in the 24 hours preceding the interview. Mothers will also be asked if they are breastfeeding at all, age of infant when they last gave breast milk, the incidence of diarrheal illness in the past two weeks, and any other foods / liquids given to infant.
Inclusion Criteria:
Exclusion Criteria: