Objective: To gain an insight into parental perceptions of infant feeding practices in five European countries. Design: An exploratory investigation using focus group discussions. Various aspects addressed included social and cultural setting for the consumption of food, infant feeding practice and behaviour, consumer health awareness and sources of information, and attitudes towards a healthy infant diet. Setting: Focus group participants were recruited from centres in five countries, Germany, Italy, Scotland, Spain and Sweden, with three focus groups being conducted in each centre. Subjects: A total of 108 parents with infants up to the age of 12 months participated in focus group discussions across these centres. Methods: Focus groups were conducted with participants from centres in five countries. Results: The majority of parents in this study chose to initiate breastfeeding and prepare infant food at home. Parents did not strictly adhere to infant feeding guidelines when introducing complementary foods into their infant's diets. There were crosscultural differences in sources of information on infant feeding practice with the paediatrician in Germany, Italy and Spain. The health visitor in Scotland and the child welfare clinics in Sweden were the most popular sources. Conclusions: A number of cultural differences and similarities in attitudes towards infant feeding practice were revealed. This makes European wide approaches to promoting healthy infant feeding difficult as different infant feeding practices are influenced not only by parental perceptions but also by advice from health professionals and feeding guidelines. Further data need to be available on parents' attitudes and beliefs towards infant feeding practice to investigate further the rationale for differing beliefs and attitudes towards infant feeding practice.
The effects of moderate red wine consumption on the antioxidant status and indices of lipid peroxidation and oxidative stress associated with CHD were investigated. A randomised, controlled study was performed with twenty free-living healthy volunteers. Subjects in the red wine group consumed 375 ml red wine daily for 2 weeks. We measured the total concentration of phenolics and analysed the individual phenolics in the wine and plasma by HPLC with tandem MS. The antioxidant capacity of plasma was measured with electron spin resonance spectroscopy while homocysteine and fasting plasma lipids were also determined. The production of conjugated dienes and thiobarbituric acid-reactive substances (TBARS) were measured in Cu-oxidised LDL. Plasma total phenolic concentrations increased significantly after 2 weeks of daily red wine consumption (P#0·001) and trace levels of metabolites, mainly glucuronides and methyl glucuronides of (þ )-catechin and (2 )-epicatechin, were detected in the plasma of the red wine group. These flavan-3-ol metabolites were not detected in plasma from the control group. The maximum concentrations of conjugated dienes and TBARS in Cu-oxidised LDL were reduced (P#0·05) and HDL cholesterol concentrations increased (P#0·05) following red wine consumption. The findings from the present study provide some evidence for potential protective effects of moderate consumption of red wine in healthy volunteers.
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Despite maternal and child health benefits, breastfeeding rates are relatively low among low-income Puerto Rican mothers. This study examined the hypothesis that monthly financial incentives would significantly increase the proportion of breastfeeding mothers at 6 months postpartum compared with Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) services only among Puerto Rican mothers.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.