Healthy Behaviors Promoted By Bassett Mothers Study

Cooperstown, N.Y. – A recently completed study conducted by Cornell University in partnership with the Bassett Healthcare Network provides encouraging information with regard to helping low income women enjoy a healthier pregnancy. 

The study by Cornell’s Division of Nutritional Sciences indicates that by providing community support and frequent information about the benefits of breast-feeding and proper nutrition, low-income mothers were three times less likely to gain excessive weight during pregnancy and more likely to continue breast-feeding.

That’s good news for mothers’ health and their infants’ health, according to Christine M. Olson, Ph.D., Division of Nutritional Sciences at Cornell University.  “From this project we learned that relatively inexpensive programs developed by community-based health and nutrition professionals, and designed to make it easier for mothers to engage in healthy behaviors, made a difference,” said Dr. Olson. “Community-based programs to create health-supportive environments supplement and reinforce the health messages given by midwives, doctors and nurses leading to better patient outcomes.”

The Bassett Mothers Health Project, funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, was part of a series of studies aimed at understanding the health of pregnant women and their babies. The objective was to find out how the health of a mother and her baby might be affected by certain characteristics of the community in which they lived. The community component consisted of the local Healthy Start Partnership and included 58 health and nutrition professionals from across eight counties served by Bassett. Partnership members worked to create changes in communities that made it easier for pregnant women and new mothers to eat well, be physically active and breast-feed. Community interventions included breast-feeding promotion campaigns, education about supporting breast-feeding in the workplace, prenatal nutrition education, physical activity maps and a region-wide Healthy Meals initiative.

510 women completed the Bassett Mothers Health Project.