Habtewold TD, Sharew NT, Alemu SM. Evidence on the effect of gender of newborn, antenatal care and postnatal care on breastfeeding practices in Ethiopia: a meta-analysis and meta-regression analysis of observational studies. BMJ Open 2019;9:e023956. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2018-023956

The following amendments were considered to the original version of this article.

Reference 35: Gultie T, Sebsibie G. Determinants of suboptimal breastfeeding practice in Debre Berhan town, Ethiopia: a cross sectional study. Int Breastfeed J 2016;11 has been excluded from the published article.

Authors have found in their meta-analysis,¹ that this study in reference 35² was retracted from the International Breastfeeding Journal in 2018 (online: 07 March 2018) because of significant overlap of both text and data with the Master’s Thesis of Hilina Ketma, “Assessment of prevalence and determinants of suboptimal breastfeeding among mothers of children aged less than two years in Dire Dawa City Administration, Ethiopia, June 2013”, which was defended at the School of Graduate Studies, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in June 2013.³

Therefore, authors have performed reanalysis by excluding Gultie and Sebsibie study (reference 35), and revised figure 3 and figure 5.

In conclusion, despite having excluded Gultie and Sebsibie study, the results show that antenatal care significantly associated with timely initiation of breastfeeding and exclusive breastfeeding. Therefore, the central findings of the original article remain unaffected.

Please, find the revised figures.

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Figure 3

Forest plot of the unadjusted odds ratios with corresponding 95% cis of 13 studies on the association of ANC and TIBF. The horizontal line represents the CI, the box and its size in the middle of the horizontal line represents the weight of sample size. The polygon represents the pooled or. The reference category is ‘no ANC follow-up’. ANC, antenatal care; LIBF, late initiation of breast feeding; REM, random-effects model; TIBF, timely initiation of breast feeding.

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Figure 5

Forest plot of the unadjusted odds ratios with corresponding 95% cis of 21 studies on the association of ANC and EBF. The horizontal line represents the CI, the box and its size in the middle of the horizontal line represents the weight of sample size. The polygon represents the pooled or. The reference category is ‘no ANC follow-up’. ANC, antenatal care; EBF, exclusive breast feeding; NEBF, non-exclusive of breast feeding; REM, random-effects model.