Resumo

PACHECO, Sandra Teixeira de Araújo  e  CABRAL, Ivone Evangelista. Feeding the baby with low birth weight at home: family coping and challenges for nursing care. Esc. Anna Nery [online]. 2011, vol.15, n.2, pp. 314-322. ISSN 1414-8145.  http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1414-81452011000200014.

Low weight babies on birth present demands of care in the feeding resulting from the metabolic needs in the first year of life, challenging the families in the confrontation between the professionals´ recommendations and the cultural practices. In order to reveal and articulate the socio-cultural practice of family in this baby´ s feeding, it applied the creative-sensitive method, at six families´ domiciles in the period of March 2008 to April 2009. According to the critical analyzes of the speech, the families revealed the hospital context, domiciliary and societal contexts of baby´s feeding, ideologically articulated with the social practice. While the hospital discourse order favored the exclusive maternal breastfeeding, the local and societal order revealed the breastfeeding and feeding cultural practices, articulated or not with professional point of view. The health professionals´ s discourse influenced the beginning of the exclusive breastfeeding, but few contributed in theirs maintenance. The family's inclusion in the interventions contributes to the production of new senses in this baby´s feeding.

Palavras-chave : Pediatric nursing; Breast Feeding; Infant, Low Birth Weight; Family; Culture.