The hands-on programme involved gradually reducing her supplemental tube feeds to increase her hunger-driven motivation to eat, while incorporating intensive behavioural strategies to develop new mealtime routines.
Having successfully remained off her feeding tube since the first week of the programme, Nakiyah's mother Shoni Reid said her daughter is proof that permanent fully-funded pilot programmes could benefit the over 600 New Zealand children with long-term feeding tube dependency.
Nakiyah, who was born with a severely inverted jaw and had trouble suckling, was given a nasogastric (NG) tube at four months after professionals said she was losing weight and failing to thrive.
Following the NG tube, which enabled food to travel directly from a machine to her stomach and involved cycles of one-hour feeding stints, Nakiyah was given a Mic-Key button in her stomach at eight months.
"I never thought three years down the track we'd still be dealing with it," said the mother of three girls, who endured an intensive battle to get her youngest daughter to eat.
As well as an inability to develop the suckling reflex, Mrs Reid said Nakiyah's aversion to food stemmed from severe gastro reflux as a baby, which saw her throw up anything that went into her stomach.
Nakiyah, who was born with an undiagnosed genetic condition, also experiences sensory issues including a fear of foods that change in texture when eaten.
"She was so freaked out about the thought of anything going in her mouth that even the thought of it could make her sick.
"I ended up in a situation where to just to get Nakiyah to try something, she'd be crying and I'd be in tears.
"I didn't know how far to push her because I didn't want it to become any more of a negative experience."
Mandy Beatson, Starship Hospital's pediatric speech language therapist who worked with Nakiyah, said she was "incredibly happy with her progress".
While New Zealand is yet to have clinical practice guidelines for weaning children from feeding tubes, Mrs Beatson said she hopes a permanent national tube weaning programme will be developed.
"A proposal compiled by Dr Tim Jelleyman, a pediatrician at Waitakere Hospital, has been submitted to the Ministry of Health, because while great community services are in place in lots of regions, they often aren't intensive enough for children with severe oral aversion."
Since Mrs Beatson's work with Nakiyah, Mrs Reid and her husband Callum are "relieved" to have watched their daughter shift from simply dissecting her food into tiny pieces, to happily putting whole items of food in her mouth.
"We're a lot more relaxed now Nakiyah is eating and gaining weight, but I do think it could have happened a lot sooner," Mrs Reid said.
"Before the programme, my only option was to spend around $30,000 for overseas help, which was money we just didn't have.
"Where's the help for families after the feeding-tube, and after the Mic-Key button?
"All I want is for other tubie families to have the same opportunity we did."
Having shed tears of mixed emotion last week as she watched her excited and healthy daughter start her first day of kindergarten, a milestone that at one point was not an option, Mrs Reid said their on-going fight "was all worth it".
"She's now where I've always dreamed she'd be."
