Protocol for establishing an infant feeding database linkable with population-based administrative data: a prospective cohort study in Manitoba, Canada

Abstract

IntroductionBreast feeding is associated with many health benefits for mothers and infants. But despite extensive public health efforts to promote breast feeding, many mothers do not achieve their own breastfeeding goals; and, inequities in breastfeeding rates persist between high and low-income mother–infant dyads. Developing targeted programme to support breastfeeding dyads and reduce inequities between mothers of different socioeconomic status are a priority for public health practitioners and health policy decision-makers; however, many jurisdictions lack the timely and comprehensive population-level data on infant-feeding practices required to monitor trends in breastfeeding initiation and duration. This protocol describes the establishment of a population-based infant-feeding database in the Canadian province of Manitoba, providing opportunities to develop and evaluate breastfeeding support programme.Methods and analysisRoutinely collected administrative health data on mothers’ infant-feeding practices will be captured during regular vaccination visits using the Teleform fax tool, which converts handwritten information to an electronic format. The infant-feeding data will be linked to the Manitoba Population Research Data Repository, a comprehensive collection of population-based information spanning health, education and social services domains. The linkage will allow us to answer research questions about infant-feeding practices and to evaluate how effective current initiatives promoting breast feeding are.Ethics and disseminationApprovals have been granted by the Health Research Ethics Board at the University of Manitoba. Our integrative knowledge translation approach will involve disseminating findings through government and community briefings, presenting at academic conferences and publishing in scientific journals.

Evaluating the Manitoba Infant Feeding Database: a Canadian infant feeding surveillance system

“…In 2015, an interdisciplinary team comprising researchers, clinicians and administrators from regional and provincial primary and public health departments partnered to develop a surveillance system in Manitoba Canada, which would leverage vaccination visits as a point of contact to collect infant feeding data during the first year of life: the Manitoba Infant Feeding Database (MIFD; Nickel et al 2017). They designed the MIFD so that infant feeding information from the motherinfant dyad could be linked with health and social data held in the Manitoba Population Research Data Repository (Jutte et al 2011;Nickel et al 2014a, b) supporting future clinical and population health research.…”

“…They designed the MIFD so that infant feeding information from the motherinfant dyad could be linked with health and social data held in the Manitoba Population Research Data Repository (Jutte et al 2011;Nickel et al 2014a, b) supporting future clinical and population health research. Detailed information on the development of the MIFD (Nickel et al 2017) and the data available in the Repository has been previously published (Jutte et al 2011).…”

Robust estimation of infant feeding indicators by data quality assessment of longitudinal electronic health records from birth up to 18 months of life

“…One of the main barriers to establishing a regular monitoring system is obtaining relievable population data, that brings to the problem to get a relevant set of variables to measure and assess the quality of large datasets. [10,[17][18][19][20].…”

“…Currently, routine collected electronic health records (EHR) data from infant community care health reviews is an excellent data source candidate for infant feeding monitoring, research and surveillance due to its population coverage and its continuity in time [17,18,[21][22][23][24][25]. Concerning this, there are previous research studies in infant feeding based on routine collected EHR [23,24,26,27].…”

Routinely collected infant feeding data: Time for global action

“…Standardised routinely collected infant feeding data by country would require internationally agreed definitions and consistent timing of data collection. It could be used by researchers and policymakers to guide selection of primary or secondary infant feeding outcomes for trials of new and complex interventions to improve breastfeeding outcomes, improve monitoring of usual care, or support the evaluation of policy and systems level changes (e.g., Hoddinott et al, ; Nickel et al, ; Relton et al, ). This alignment would enable the use of more practicable and sophisticated strategies to evaluate complex breastfeeding interventions, for example, comparing infant feeding rates and outcomes between populations over time.…”