title: Development of the breast milk expression experience measure.
abstract: Exclusive breastfeeding provides optimal nutrition through 6 months. Recent research has shown that milk expression may affect breastfeeding duration. A woman's experience with milk expression might mediate the effect of milk expression on breastfeeding duration. The objective of this study was to develop a measure to evaluate women's experiences of expressing milk. Based on the available literature, we developed a brief measure of the Breast Milk Expression Experience (BMEE) assessing three dimensions: (1) social support for milk expression; (2) ease of learning how to express milk; and (3) personal experiences of milk expression. All items used 1-5 Likert scales, with higher scores indicating better experiences. We administered the items immediately after expression to 68 mothers who expressed milk post-partum. We evaluated this measure for reliability using Cronbach's alpha. Mothers completing the BMEE were 57% primiparous with 75% vaginal births. The BMEE demonstrated appropriate reliability with a Cronbach's alpha of 0.703 for the summary index and 0.719-0.763 for social support, learning experience and personal experience subscales. The BMEE also indicated good predictive validity; of the six mothers who had a mean score <3 on the 11-item scale post-partum, two (33.3%) were expressing breast milk at 1 month, compared with 37 (80.4%) of the 46 mothers who had a mean score ≥3 on the 11-item scale post-partum (P = 0.012). The BMEE is a promising measure of milk expression experience in this population. Use of this measure may allow improved understanding of women's experiences expressing milk.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, School of Medicine, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California 94143-0503, USA. flahermanv@peds.ucsf.edu
authors.forename: Valerie J
authors.initials: VJ
authors.lastname: Flaherman
authors.forename: Barbara
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Gay
authors.forename: Cheryl
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Scott
authors.forename: Janelle
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Aby
authors.forename: Anita L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Stewart
authors.forename: Kathryn A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Lee
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D061186:Breast Milk Expression / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008895:Milk, Human; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012944:Social Support; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires