Dear colleagues,

I am currently reviewing an IYCF-E programme for which bottle-exchange was one of the activities i.e. cup feeding was promoted, and caregivers could exchange a feeding bottle for a cup. Feedback was received from service users that this activity encouraged poor IYCF practices, as it was necessary to be bottle feeding in order to receive a cup. Whilst there is no evidence available that caregivers did in fact change their practices just to receive a cup, it is possible that this was an unintended negative consequence of this activity. As part of this review we have also considered that requiring a mother to physically hand over a bottle may pose a barrier, as mothers may wish to try cup feeding at home before deciding to give up bottle feeding entirely.

I am looking for experiences of how bottle-exchange has been carried out elsewhere in order to provide suggestions on how this activity can be improved in the future. If anyone could please share their experiences of how bottle-exchange activities are implemented that would be great. (e.g. what were the conditions required for a caregiver to receive a feeding cup? was a caregiver required to hand over a bottle in order to receive a cup? any challenges / successes / lessons learned?)

Thank you!

Isabelle