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Standardization of Early Feeding Skills (EFS) scale in preterm infants
Constanza Abarzúa P1, Ana Godoy M2, Mariana Rubilar P3
1Departamento de Administración de Educación municipal, Ilustre Municipalidad de Vilcún, Chile.
Insights
The Early Feeding Skills (EFS) scale helps assess premature infants' feeding abilities. While useful for identifying challenges, it requires complementary methods for a full evaluation of newborn feeding.
Area of Science:
- Neonatal care
- Pediatric nutrition
- Developmental pediatrics
Background:
- The Early Feeding Skills (EFS) scale was developed to assess neonate behavior during feeding.
- Understanding feeding behaviors is crucial for premature infant development.
Purpose of the Study:
- To validate the Early Feeding Skills (EFS) scale for face and content.
- To evaluate the feeding process in premature newborns using the EFS scale.
- To compare EFS scale results with relevant variables.
Main Methods:
- A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted on premature newborns (34-36 weeks corrected age).
- The validated Early Feeding Skills (EFS) scale was used to collect data.
- Feeding skills, gender, and breastfeeding achievement were assessed by two observers.
Main Results:
- 75.3% of infants showed poor performance in focusing on food, with sex-based differences.
- Most infants demonstrated equitable performance in motor-oral organization (68.8%), swallowing coordination (95.2%), and physiological stability (96.7%).
- 41.6% of infants had poor oral food tolerance.
Conclusions:
- The Early Feeding Skills (EFS) scale effectively describes oral feeding in premature infants and highlights areas needing intervention.
- The EFS scale is a valuable tool but not sufficient for a comprehensive newborn feeding evaluation.
Introduction:
The Early Feeding Skills (EFS) scale assessed the neonate's behavior before, during, and after the feeding process.
Objectives:
To determine the face and content validity, and to evaluate with this scale the feeding process in premature newborns comparing with relevant variables.
Patients And Method:
Premature newborns were evaluated; they were between 34 to 36 weeks of corrected age, without neurological damage or craniofacial malformations. Cross-sectional descriptive study. The data were obtained through the EFS scale, version corrected by face and content validation. The study variables were gender, breastfeeding achievement, and feeding skills during the feeding process, evaluated by two observers. Dispersion measures were analyzed, and the Fisher test was used at 5% significance, establishing the association of the obtained results with the variables.
Results:
5 domains were evaluated: (1) Ability to stay focused on food, in which 75.3% have a poor performance level, and 28.6% equitable, with significant differences in the sex variable. (2) Ability to organize motor- oral functioning presents 10.5% deficient, 68.8% equitable, and 20.6% good. (3) Ability to coordinate swallowing 95.2% presents an equitable performance. (4) Ability to maintain physiological stability 96.7% was equitable; and (5) Evaluation of oral food tolerance presents 41.6% of poor performance.
Conclusion:
The EFS scale is a tool that provides relevant information to describe the oral feeding process in premature infants, allowing to identify the areas of greatest difficulty that require profes sional treatment, however, this tool is not enough by itself to carry a comprehensive evaluation of the newborn feeding process.
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