ABSTRACT
Objectives
To identify the closest person to the pregnant woman, who acts as her primary support source, and evaluate the relationship quality through the instrument quality with the persons close to her and their influence on breastfeeding.
Method
Quantitative, descriptive, and exploratory study with a consecutive non-probabilistic sample of 152 pregnant women, in Health Units in a medium-sized municipality in the western region of Paraná, during the year 2019, to answer the research question “does the quality of the relationship between women in pregnancy and their primary source of support have implications for breastfeeding?. The “Quality of the relationship with the closest people scale - ARI” was used to obtain the data, which classifies the bond using points that can vary from 40 to 128, and the higher, the higher will be the quality of the bond with that person. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics.
Results
Women identified the partner/husband (58.6%) and other family members (40.1%) as the most important and active people as their primary support source. The average score was 103.5, indicating that the relationship is healthy and positive aspects predominate.
Conclusion
The more positive the results, the greater the support received by the pregnant woman and, consequently, the greater the influence for the woman to initiate and maintain exclusive breastfeeding.
Implications for the clinical practice
The scale used can be applied regularly in primary care for nurses to identify fragile bonds that would influence breastfeeding.
Keywords:
Breastfeeding; Social Support; Pregnant Women; Women Health; Primary Health Care