Parental Feeding Strategies and Outcomes During Complementary Food Introduction Among Preterm Infants at 12 Months...

Area of Science:

• Pediatric Nutrition
• Infant Feeding Development
• Parent-Child Feeding Dynamics

Background:

• Introducing complementary foods is a critical phase for preterm infants and their parents.
• Parental feeding strategies significantly impact long-term feeding outcomes.
• The specific effects of these strategies on later feeding skills and problems are not well understood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To examine patterns of parental feeding strategy use in preterm infants during complementary feeding.
• To assess the association between these strategies and infant feeding skills and problem symptoms at 12 months corrected age.

Main Methods:

• Parents of preterm infants completed feeding surveys from 1 to 12 months corrected age.
• Infant feeding skills (Child Oral and Motor Proficiency Scale) and feeding problem symptoms (Pediatric Eating Assessment Tool) were assessed.
• Patterns of parental strategy use were identified and correlated with outcomes at 12 months.

Main Results:

• Four distinct patterns of parental strategy use were identified.
• Using two or more feeding strategies frequently was linked to increased feeding problem symptoms at 12 months corrected age.
• No significant association was found between strategy use patterns and infant feeding skills.

Conclusions:

• Parental feeding strategies during complementary feeding can influence feeding problem symptoms in preterm infants.
• Further research is needed to understand the causal links and evolving parental decision-making in feeding strategies.