The Effect of Psychological Interventions on the Anxiety and Breastfeeding Self-Efficacy: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Maternal anxiety has been accompanied by many unfavorable effects on breastfeeding in the postpartum period. We aimed to provide scientific evidence in identifying effective interventions for anxiety and breastfeeding self-efficacy (BSE) in a systematic review and meta-analysis.

All published studies with inclusion criteria by 2022 were searched in Embase, Cochrane library, Web of Sciences, Google Scholar, PubMed, Scopus, SID and Magiran. The literature search was performed using PRISMA instructions. Further, 20 eligible interventional studies (RCT and pre-posttest) and one case study were included in this systematic review and meta-analysis. Publication bias was checked with Eggers test and funnel plot methods. The collected data were analyzed using stata version16.

It is not possible to provide an explicit and accurate conclusion about the effective intervention method in reducing anxiety and increasing BSE among lactating women during the covid19 pandemic. The results indicated a significant increase in BSE among lactating women after educational and psychological inter-ventions (4.20, 95% CI: 3.61 to 4.80, I2 = 26.38%).

It is recommended to conduct further studies with a strong methodology and based on interven-tion methods during the postpartum period, especially in the first month of birth to reduce the symptoms of stress and anxiety in the mother, establish better mother-child attachment, and improve BSE and maternal per-formance during the Covid-19 pandemic.