Intervention to Increase Breastfeeding Rates of Mothers Diagnosed with COVID-19

Background: During the COVID-19 pandemic, the maternal care facilities face a great dilemma with child births, regarding the possible need to discontinue breastfeeding of infected mothers. Although, until now, evidence on the risk of transmission via breast milk is limited, there are still great concerns in daily clinical practice regarding the safety of the infants.

Project Aim: Present the process of a tertiary medical center through special designed interventions and collaboration of multidisciplinary medical teams to protect, promote, and support breastfeeding during the pandemic.

Methods: Following the recommendations of WHO, Taiwan CDC, and various Taiwan medical professions on newborn care of COVID-19 infected mother, standard operating procedures (SOP) for pregnant women confirmed COVID-19 infection through meetings in May, 2022.
Mother of COVID-19 infection will be admitted to a dedicated ward. Precautions will be taken during the birthing process. And after birth, the baby is admitted to the NICU or NBC initially for observation and treatment. Interventions to improve and support breastfeeding in COVID-19 infected mother were implemented since May 23, 2022.

Results: Due to the pandemic, the breastfeeding rate of the hospital dropped from 95.57% to 93.50%. The neonatal units breastfeeding rate also declined from 94.20% to 87.33%. The neonatal units began to implement the special interventions in May of 2022. The exclusive breastfeeding rate rose from 35.29% before intervention to 100% after interventions, a nearly 183.36% improvement.

Conclusions: Through solidifying the implementation of certain interventions and multidisciplinary collaboration, breastfeeding of COVID-19 infected mothers can be improved.

Publication: Not applicable

Diversity and Inclusion: While this study does not discriminate cases on the basis of race, color, national origin or sex preference; due to its setting of one particular hospital, the cases enrolled in the project are mostly Asian and women.

This study was also supported by the authors:
Shu Hui Lin – Head Nurse, Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital buddhist Tzu Chi l Medical Foundation
Mung Jung Lee – Department of Community and Long-term Care Center, Deputy Director, Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital, Buddhist Tzu Chi Medical Foundation, New Taipei City, Taiwan