OBJECTIVES: to study pacifier use prevalence and its association to feeding practices. METHODS: data collected from the "Amamentação e Municípios" ("Breast-feeding and Municipalities") project in 1999 were analyzed. The association between pacifier use and exclusive breast-feeding interruption was verified through the chi2 test. RESULTS: prevalence of the pacifier use in 22.188 children from 0 - 4 months was high (61,3%) and varied from 32,8% to 78,4% in 111 cities. Early pacifier introduction was noted (53,9% in children less than one month old) as well as association between pacifier use and exclusive breast-feeding (EBF) and breast-feeding (BF) (p <0,05) interruption. There was a higher prevalence of bottle-feeding among pacifier users. CONCLUSIONS: it is necessary to increase the number of protective, promotion and supportive actions to breast-feeding to reduce the high pacifier prevalence determined by this study. Child Friendly Hospital Initiatives should be included.
Breast feeding; Infant care; Bottle feeding
