New efforts to improve hospital food have been unveiled today by Welsh Labour’s Health Minister Edwina Hart as it was announced that the Royal College of Nursing Wales will be commissioned to deliver nutritional training in each NHS Trust.
Staff involved in the whole food chain – those buying, cooking and serving hospital food – will attend workshops in order to improve the quality of the meals provided for patients. The workshops will also cover protected mealtimes and assisted feeding for those that need it.
It follows the recommendation of a group set up by the Minister to look at hospital food, and a recent report by nurse leaders which made a number of recommendations to improve patients’ experience of hospital stays. Last March, Mrs Hart also announced the NHS would ban unhealthy vending machines in hospitals. Only one NHS hospital in Wales out of 130 will not have healthy vending in place by 2010.
This work in hospitals complements the Labour-led Assembly Government’s wider efforts to improve nutritional standards in schools through the Appetite for Life agenda.
Edwina Hart said: “From listening to patients, I know that they often have strong views about the quality of food they are given in hospital. I want to ensure that the meals patients are served not only taste better, but are more nutritional and therefore conducive to them making a speedier recovery. On top of the recent recommendations from the Empowering Ward Sisters Report and my decision to ban unhealthy vending machines in hospitals, these workshops will further improve the patient experience.”
