Infant Feeding Practice and Associated Factors among HIV Positive Mothers at Health Institution of Shashemene Town, South Ethiopia

Objective: To assess Infant feeding practice and associated factors among HIV positive mothers at health institution of Shashemene town, South Ethiopia. Materials and methods: Facility based cross sectional study was conducted. The study used all the study population as source of data since they are small in number hence sample size calculation was not needed. This study was conducted at health institutions which provide ART and PMTCT service at Shashemene town. Structured questionnaires were developed by reviewing different literatures. Data collectors were trained and data were collected from February to March 2018. The data were analyzed using statistical package for social science (SPSS) version 20, descriptive statistics as well as bivariate and multivariate analysis were computed to identify the independent predictor of infant feeding practice and to control effect of confounders. Results: On this study majority 175 (90.7%) of respondent breast feed their infants. Regarding feeding option about 154 (79.8%) chose EBF followed by complementary feeding. Concerning feeding practice majority of respondent 172 (89.1%) utilize safe feeding practice. On multivariate analysis only Counseling provided by health professional on infant feeding option was found as independent predictors of infant feeding practice with [AOR = 4.538 (CI = 1.099, 18.736)]. Conclusion: Higher proportion of HIV positive mothers follow safe infant feeding practice. Counseling by health professional was found as independent predictors of infant feeding practice. Further counseling by health professional needed to discourage mixed feeding practice.