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Strengthen the Evidence for Maternal and Child Health Programs

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Established Evidence Results

Results for Measure: Breastfeeding

Below are articles that support specific interventions to advance MCH National Performance Measures (NPMs) and Standardized Measures (SMs). Most interventions contain multiple components as part of a coordinated strategy/approach.

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Displaying records 1 through 1 (1 total).

Hawkins SS, Stern AD, Gillman MW. Do state breastfeeding laws in the USA promote breast feeding? J Epidemiol Community Health. 2013;67(3):250-256.

Evidence Rating: Emerging Evidence

Intervention Components (click on component to see a list of all articles that use that intervention): POPULATION-BASED SYSTEMS, STATE, Policy/Guideline (State)

Intervention Description: We examined the impact of state breastfeeding laws on breastfeeding initiation and duration as well as on disparities in these infant feeding practices.

Intervention Results: Breastfeeding initiation was 1.7 percentage points higher in states with new laws to provide break time and private space for breastfeeding employees (p=0.01), particularly among Hispanic mothers (adjusted coefficient 0.058). While there was no overall effect of laws permitting mothers to breast feed in any location, among Black mothers we observed increases in breastfeeding initiation (adjusted coefficient 0.056). Effects on breastfeeding duration were in the same direction, but slightly weaker.

Conclusion: State laws that support breast feeding appear to increase breastfeeding rates. Most of these gains were observed among Hispanic and Black women and women of lower educational attainment suggesting that such state laws may help reduce disparities in breast feeding.

Study Design: QE: pretest-posttest

Setting: National

Population of Focus: All mothers at 4 months postpartum

Data Source: Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS)

Sample Size: 2000 (n=30,899) 2008 (n=36,512)

Age Range: Not specified

Access Abstract

The MCH Digital Library is one of six special collections at Geogetown University, the nation's oldest Jesuit institution of higher education. It is supported in part by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under award number U02MC31613, MCH Advanced Education Policy with an award of $700,000/year. The library is also supported through foundation and univerity funding. This information or content and conclusions are those of the author and should not be construed as the official position or policy of, nor should any endorsements be inferred by HRSA, HHS or the U.S. Government.